Hurt Me
by Seab1rds0ng
Summary: After Fenris walks out and breaks her heart, Hawke finds herself in a passionate but doomed love affair with Anders, but still unable to purge her mind of the elf she can't stop loving.
1. Chapter 1

It had been eight, nine minutes at least since she arrived at the door but she couldn't seem to do anything other than look at it. The giant rectangle of heavy dented wood was cast a silvery blue in the moonlight and she had begun to think of it as a kind of sentry, protecting those on boths sides of it from their own stupidity. She kept thinking she had already knocked, only to realize that was only in her imagination. After playing out all the possible ways things could go in her sluggish, wine soaked mind, she still was not sure what exactly it was she was hoping for. But the meantime the blood on her hands was getting sticky, her fingers tacking together every time she fidgeted. You can't stand here forever, her drunken mind told her. Either knock, or leave.

Finally she put her knuckles to the door and banged, sounding off an alarm of pain that shot up her hand and to her elbow. She had been at this door countless times before and knew that a quiet knock wouldn't be heard, but she gripped her wrist in surprise at the force she had used, as well as the intensity of the pain. The punches she had thrown against the heads of the two street urchins who just accosted her must have knocked something in her wrist out of place.

She was about to turn and go, grateful that the Maker was denying her her bad decision, when the door opened. His warm brown eyes looked her over, mapping out the bloodstains that were dripping off her leather suit.

"You're hurt." he said with a worried urgency, "Come in."

She walked in wordlessly, feeling adrenaline shoot up her spine in preparation for the night's inevitable continuation of poor choices. That whole day had been a sort of a rampage, beginning in High town as she walked the streets in front of Fenris's house, wanting to scream at him, wanting to bang on his door and ask him why? Wanting to cry and wrap herself in his arms. Why did he walk out like that?

Anders' hands flew over her body, pulling and inspecting her leathers at their bloodiest spots. She stood there and let him, watching his face as the reality dawned on him.

"This isn't your blood." he said finally, standing to look into her eyes with a quizzical expression.

She shook her head in confirmation and took in the features of his face. "My wrist hurts." she said as she held out the hand she had knocked on his door with, which was still throbbing with pain.

His warm hands enclosed gently over her injured wrist and she felt the energy grow under his touch, a soothing buzz that penetrated all the way through her flesh and bones, spreading a welcome numbness up her arm. When it subsided, her pain was gone.

"What happened?" he asked her. She shrugged, feeling her body sway with the effort. "Just the usual street thugs." she said.

The truth was, the two men weren't even trying to rob her, and they hadn't tried to kill her until after she punched them both for the disgusting comments they were making. But then they fought back with a viciousness that she found herself enjoying. She wished she had dragged the fight out longer; it was over before she was ready to stop hitting them.

"Hawke, what's wrong?" he asked. She had never done anything like this before. Showed up on his doorstep, alone in the middle of the night, at an hour that no sane person should be out walking the streets.

But after the two bottles of wine she put away at The Hanged Man, she had been looking for a fight.

"Hawke?" he asked as he grabbed her shoulders and shook her until her eyes finally met his.

If things had gone a little bit differently over the past couple years it could have been Anders and not Fenris who was currently in possession of her heart.

Anders had those warm brown eyes that shimmered with intensity, and an appealing softness that was so very different from Fenris's fiery aggression. The two of them couldn't be any more different.

And Anders had never hid his attraction to Hawke. It was well known that if she wanted him, he was hers for the taking, despite all his warnings about Justice, all his proclamations about how he would inevitably hurt her.

She dragged her eyes over the lines of his face, taking in his long slender nose and the soft curve of his lips. But something was different tonight, besides the fact that he had clearly just emerged from bed. He must have just thrown on his robe before coming to the door, as his feet were bare.

He looked at her with deep concern and she realized she still hadn't answered him. She didn't even know where to begin. Her love had abandoned her, she had the weight of the whole city on her shoulders, she had consumed more wine in a single sitting than she could ever remember doing before. She had been wandering through the streets of Kirkwall since before the sun went down and she felt a deep weariness in her bones. There was so much that was wrong, but while it was enough to make her feel that she was being eaten up from the inside out, it was still nothing compared to a life as a slaver's pet, or a hunted apostate whose body housed an uncontrollable spirit. For all the aching in her gut, her actual problems were laughable. What could she say about what was wrong that wouldn't just sound pathetic to someone like Anders?

He let her go and rushed off into the rear of the clinic and she still couldn't bring herself to move. He returned with a glass of water which he thrust into her hand. She took a deep drink and realized how parched her mouth and throat were. She emptied the glass and he took it back, and stood before her quietly.

His hair was down. That's what was different, she realized. He had pushed it back behind his ears, and it was tousled from sleep. In the dim light his brown eyes glinted, two dark glowing coals that ebbed and pulsed from within golden skin. He walked the glass over to a table and set it down. When he turned to walk back, his hair loosed itself and fell along his face. She had always felt Anders was attractive, always relished the way his dark eyes would clamp onto her, studying her face with an intensity that would make her feel naked even when she was standing before him in twenty pounds of armor.

He stopped before her, searching her face for anything that might help him make sense of her behavior, her uncharacteristic silence.

She let her eyes linger on his face. She wanted to see the hunger in his impossibly expressive eyes for her again.

Hawke raised her hand and smoothed a tendril of his hair back behind his ear. She let her fingers work slowly, taking in the cool slickness of the clump of soft strands, and the delicate warmth of his ear.

His eyes darkened as her hand slid from his ear, down his neck and then dropped off his chest. He drew a deep shaky breath.

"Hawke," he whispered. "What are you doing here?"

"You're a healer, right?" she answered finally. "I need healing."

He swallowed loudly, his mouth sounding dry.

"Was there more than just your wrist? There should be considering all this blood…Maker, what did you do to those men?"

"I did what we do. What we all do." she said. Killing two men was a light night of business for the Champion and her crew.

"What else hurts?" he asked.

She thought a minute, her mind a quagmire of emotions and suppressed urges all fighting for dominance.

"Everything." she breathed.

She watched his expression turn to one of anguish and pain, and for the first time, she considered what it was that she was asking of him. Had she really walked here from The Hanged Man with the purpose of toying with a good man's heart? How did she really want this go? A surge of conscience invaded her, draining her of whatever selfish and deranged impulse it was that had brought her here.

"I shouldn't have come." she whispered, "I'm sorry."

She knew now that he could see the bad decision she had tried to make, and could feel the argument he seemed to be having with himself about it.

"You can stay." he said finally.

She searched his face and deep into his soft eyes for anything that looked like awareness of what he was doing, what he was allowing of her.

"No," she croaked. "I wasn't thinking." She turned, intent on walking back out that damn door that it had taken her forever to come through. But a warm hand closed around her elbow, gently holding on. She stopped. He was standing close now, his hot breath sweeping softly over the side of her neck.

She turned to look at him, his face was now lowered much closer to hers and framed by a curtain of shaggy blonde hair that partially obscured his eyes.

"I'm sorry," she tried to turn away again, but again his grip held tight.

He was quiet for a moment, swallowing heavily.

"It's okay." he said, his words barely audible. "Stay."

"I don't want to hurt you." she said.

Her heartbeat was like a stampede in her ears as the seconds stretched on. She didn't want to break his heart the way that Fenris had just broken hers, but couldn't seem to force herself to break free of his hold.

"Hurt me," he implored. "I want you to."

Those words strummed a chord deep within her. What had her whole night been about, if not to satisfy some desire to punish herself and punish everyone else as well? Hurt me. He was asking her for it, but could she really do that to him?

She turned to face him again, letting her hand raise itself back up to the hair that was obscuring his eyes, smoothing it back behind his ear once again. Her hand lingered at the base of his jaw, seeming to have a mind of its own. He took another step closer, standing only inches away now. She became sharply aware of the closeness of his lips, and of the hot woodsy scent that was emanating off his skin.

"Anders…" she began, not sure how to finish the sentence, but knowing she needed to say more. The gap between them was closing, and if she didn't refuse him now, she wasn't sure she would be able to once his lips were upon hers. She had come with the hope of feeling his arms around her, of losing herself in a hot, sweaty jumble of limbs and skin. But now that just seemed cruel. Anders wanted much more than just that from her, and she couldn't offer anything but her body to him. At least not tonight.

He seemed to see her thoughts, and he whispered "Please."

The seconds continued to stretch long and heavy as his lips hovered so close to hers. Her mouth was watering for him, ready to dive in to all the pleasures and pains he could offer her. He could end their suffering himself, if he was to take her then. But he was holding back, letting her be the one to decide once and for all.

She conjured up a mental image of Fenris, his large green eyes and the small curl of his lips as he smiled. She recalled the way the lyrium markings on his skin glowed a light blue in the dark during their one night together. She wanted to trace her fingers along them, but was afraid to hurt him. If there was any chance of him returning to her, striking up an affair with Anders was a sure way to ruin it. It helped to steel her conviction and she took a deep breath.

"I want to" she said. "I want to so badly. But I can't. This was foolish. I shouldn't have come. I'm so sorry."

She braced herself for the disappointment she knew he would feel, and winced at the profound regret that was coursing through her. She had already gone too far, gotten his hopes up.

His hand fell from her elbow and he cleared his throat.

She immediately wanted to run back out of the clinic and jump into the first fight she could find, except this time she would let herself lose. Let the bloody mess of her body get scraped off the street the following morning. She deserved nothing less. She looked down at her bloodstained boots, unable to meet his eyes again.

"Sleep here. You can take my bed." he said.

It was a sensible suggestion. No one in their right mind should be wandering the streets at this hour. And it was likely she would just end up in front of Fenris' home again, if she made it to High Town at all.

She nodded.

"Except…" he stopped.

"What?"

"Well, Hawke you're covered in blood."

"Right. Of course I'll wash up first." she said and he led her to a barrel of water. Most of the blood on her leather had begun to dry, and she was too tired to tackle the mess. She unbuckled the pieces, sliding them down off her body and leaving them in a pile on the floor, until she was standing there in her underclothes. She wet the cloth and scrubbed at the blood spatter that had made it between the pieces of leathers to stain her skin.

She turned to see Anders walking toward her with averted eyes, and he set a burning candle down on the nearby table.

"I think I need your help." she said turning to face him. "Did I get it all? I can't see my face, or my back."

"Um, okay. Let me see." he said as he stepped into the light with her. She handed him the cloth and he tilted her chin up so he could peer down into her face. She couldn't read his expression, his eyes seemed to be boarded up now, not giving any indication of what he was thinking. He looked over her clinically, the way he must have looked at his patients, inspecting all the features of her face but not lingering.

She felt a faint, buzzing vibration at his touch. It wasn't until he turned her around and was using the cloth on the back of her arms that she realized it must have been his magic.

She turned to take his hand, and let it rest in her own.

"You are… buzzing." she said.

"Sorry." he said simply, offering no explanation.

"I have held my sister's hand a million times and I have never… felt her magic like this. Is this normal?" she asked him.

"Not always. It happens sometimes when I... " he stopped. He was speaking so quietly she had to move closer so she could hear him. The buzzing in his hand made the skin on her palm tingle and itch. She wanted to reach up and touch him somewhere else, to see if she could feel it everywhere.

"When you what?"

"When I am… stressed."

"Oh, of course. Anders… I am sorry, I feel like such a fool." she said and she released his hand.

It was so close to what Fenris had said to her before he walked out, leaving her to lay alone with a racing mind and a roiling heart for hours before the sun finally rose. And she was about to do the same thing to her kind and gentle friend. Despite what she could feel was a deep well of potentially terrifying power streaming just below his skin, she began to realize that Anders was the more vulnerable one out of the two of them in that moment. She suddenly felt like the scum of the earth.

"I don't mean to tease you." she whispered. "I really am sorry. I care about you so much." she said. Finally his gaze met hers again, and she felt him soften a little.

"Where is Fenris?" he asked. She had been expecting that question since the moment she laid eyes on him after the door opened.

"Not with me. Not anymore apparently." she said.

He nodded quietly and set the cloth down on the counter. Taking her hand, he led her back into his quarters, and picked up a light cotton robe for her to put on. It was soft and enveloped her in his scent. She wrapped it around herself and watched as Anders began walking out of the room.

"Where are you going to sleep?" she asked him.

"I have beds out in the clinic for patients. I'll just take one of those. Goodnight Hawke. "

She stood there and watched as he turned to walk out of the room, and she felt a stabbing pain in her gut. She didn't want to be alone. She didn't want to use and abuse him, but she could barely stomach watching him walk away, leaving her by herself in his small, sparse room, which had a bed big enough for two.

"Wait." she said so quiet she wasn't sure if he heard, but he stopped.

"You could stay. Just to sleep. If you want." she said. "If you don't mind sleeping beside me."

"I'm afraid that might be more than I could bear." he said over his shoulder, and then closed the door behind him.

She sighed and felt tears sting her eyes. She blinked them back and settled down into Anders' bed. It was soft and she smelled him everywhere. She nuzzled her face down into the pillow and pulled the blankets tight around her. It took only minutes before she dropped off into a black, empty sleep.

Sometime in the night, she felt the bed beside her sink down with the weight of another body, and it dragged her out of her dreamless slumber. She turned to find Anders laying beside her, situated just far enough away that no part of him touched her.

She reached a hand out and laid it gently on his shoulder.

"I'm sorry. I must get some better beds out there. That was agonizing."

"It's okay." she said and she drew her hand back and tucked it under her cheek. She didn't want to make this harder for him than necessary.

Her eyes blinked at the darkness between them. There was no window in his small room, and the candle he brought with him had been extinguished. The room was pitch black, but she could hear his soft breathing, could feel the warmth radiating off him.

"How is your wrist?" he asked softly.

"Good as new." she answered.

"And everything else?"

She thought a moment. She had told him that everything hurt. And it had. Her mind, her heart, her body, it all hurt.

"Still a mess." she said.

For several seconds all she could hear was the sound of her own heart and she thought he must be trying to sleep now. But then his voice cut through the dark again.

"Would it help if I held you?" he asked.

Hawke immediately wanted him to, and wanted it badly.

"Yes." she whispered.

They scooted together and she settled herself into the crook of his body. The arms that encircled her felt very different from Fenris's wiry limbs. Anders' whole body was softer. Still lean and muscled, but the weight of her settled into him and not just up against him. He was warm and didn't pull her too close or too tight. She exhaled a deep breath, finally feeling a deeper sense of comfort. Anders' fingers caressed her hair softly, raising small pleasant shivers along her skin. She closed her eyes and let his soothing embrace wash over her, luring her back into the black abyss of sleep. But this time the blackness wasn't as cold or as empty.

She woke again, feeling as though she had been sleeping for years. Her head was pounding and the room was still pitch black, but she could hear the low rumbling of voices not far outside her door. She felt around in the bed and discovered that she was alone. Anders must have risen to greet some refugees come to his clinic for help. She felt beside the bed for the bedside table and her hand tumbled over the candle. Using her fingertips as eyes, she located the small case of matches and struck one of the slender sticks across the wood of the table. It flared brightly, illuminating the wrinkled indentation beside her where Anders had slept.

She rose and noticed the glass of water sitting on the bedside table. She was sure Anders wouldn't mind her drinking it. He might even have set it there just for her.

Peeking out the door, she confirmed that Anders and his patients were in a part of the clinic not visible from the little rear hallway, so she crept quietly around the corner and over to the washroom that still had her pile of bloodied leathers. They had the sharp, tangy smell of souring blood and she shivered to put them back on without cleaning them, but didn't see any other option. She didn't want to waste all of his water in cleaning up this mess, and wearing his robe as she exited the clinic would only stir up gossip. Gossip that would be mostly wrong, and would definitely get back to Fenris.

She decided the best way to exit through the people between her and the outer door was to stride out with her head held high and to act perfectly natural, like there was nothing at all of note to see.

She took a deep breath and with a quick pace, emerged into the main room of the clinic. Several pairs of surprised eyes looked up at her and she nodded a hello to everyone.

"My wrist feels much better Anders. Thanks again." she said to him as she walked past him. He was standing in front of a small boy, his hands travelling softly over his skinny outstretched leg. Anders' warm brown eyes followed her as she made her way to the door.

"Any time Hawke." he called, and then turned his attention back to the boy.

The sun pierced her eyes when she stepped out into the open air, but despite her still faintly throbbing headache, she felt rested. It couldn't have been many hours that she had slept in Anders' arms, but what sleep she did get seemed to have been the restorative salve that her body severely needed.

Instead of walking home, she turned to the docks. Upon reaching the glinting water, she knelt down over the edge of the ramshackle pier, and pulled up handfuls of water to help her scrub the remains of the blood off her leathers.

When she had gotten the worst of it off, she stood, feeling rested and empty, and began the long walk back home.

From the very beginning Fenris was like a current of electricity, a live wire stripped of all protective coatings and ready to burn anyone nearby at the slightest urging. It stemmed from the unnameable and immeasurable burden of hatred that he carried, and it was clear that no matter what revenge it caused him to dish out to his opponents, it was he that suffered as its greatest victim.

But in those quiet moments alone in Danarius's mansion, when he would suck down a bottle of wine and get wistful and soft in his storytelling, Hawke saw under that hard shell. Everything in his identity had been given to him by people he despised; fickle masters trying to shape him into the perfect attack dog and party favor, and who used him as a psychological punching bag when they had no one for him to kill or intimidate. And those cruel people had the power over him that they did largely because of magic. While for Anders the Circle was a prison, Fenris's prison had bars held in place by the talents and corruption of mages. They both sought freedom, and saw the other as their oppressor. The men were two sides of the same coin, Hawke realized. And she sat somewhere in the middle, the sharp and crooked edge dividing heads from tails.

She had noticed the violent internal struggle in Fenris' eyes anytime he thought no one was paying attention. He would sit silently as she questioned dignitaries and business partners, negotiating terms and payment, and he would slip out of the room without moving a muscle. Against the backdrop of a turbulent, explosive Kirkwall, she saw a man living quietly in a completely different but equally precarious reality. But it was the hidden underbelly of softness that was also there that pained her most. To take the gentle, contemplative spirit that she saw in their private moments, and twist it into the hard mask he wore the rest of time could only have taken great and prolonged efforts on the part of his master.

She had told herself she was trying to help him find who he really was, underneath all the traits that had been molded into him by hands not his own. She didn't know if he could truly feel free if he couldn't locate a piece of himself that was authentically his, a part that still would be there if the entire trajectory of his life had been different, if he had been born in a different time or a different land. He was searching, always searching. For meaning, for peace, for direction, for vengeance. But nothing ever felt the way he expected it to, further intensifying his despairing feeling that he did not, could not truly know himself.

Hawke had been absolutely captivated by him since almost the moment he had appeared. Mesmerized by the markings that glowed an icy blue, by the shimmers of incredible vulnerability that hid beneath the cracks in his broody facade. She had loved how open he was with her when they were alone. She had began to think that maybe she could really help him. Maybe she was the only one who really could.

"I have been thinking of you. In fact I've been able to think of little else." He had practically growled when she came upon him waiting for her at her home, going on five weeks ago now. His head was lowered the way a servant would speak to his master, but he had approached her aggressively, like he was ready for a fight. Seeing him stride so powerfully toward her had put her stomach through the floor, even before she processed the words he had spoken. "Command me to go, and I shall." he had said. All she could think to say in response was a single word: "Stay." She had been aching to touch him for months now, her fingers practically tingling with the urge anytime they had been close. He had mentioned the pain in his markings and so she resisted, but when he finally kissed her, he seemed to register no discomfort. He kissed her as though they were in battle and he was trying to slay her dead with only the power of his embrace, his arms trembling in their effort. His soft warm lips captured her whole mouth and took it hostage, and she had immediately surrendered to him. It was the single most passionate experience she had ever had in her life up until that point.

But Fenris hadn't even given her a single full night. Two hours, maybe three, before she woke to find him, fully dressed and standing beside the dying fire. He had begun to remember his life before his markings. He said it all came rushing back in a rapid series of flashes, and then left as quickly as it came. "I can't do this. It's too much… I can't." he said.

She rushed out of bed, not caring about how little she wore and stepped between him and the door.

"No...don't leave me already," she begged.

"Just stay the night. Just tonight. We don't have to do anything you don't want to. We can just talk. Or sleep. Just stay, please." she asked, feeling the flood of tears building up behind her eyes, sobs rising in her throat. She forced them back down. "Fenris, we can work through this."

"I'm sorry" he said as he walked out the door. He turned for just a moment, meeting her eyes as she stood there, paralyzed in place and preparing for the imminent torrent of anguish about to be unleashed in her. And then he was gone.

Hawke threw herself down onto the bed and cried hard into her pillow. She had put so much time and effort over the last years in building a trusting relationship with him, and the way he spoke about his feelings for her had caused her breathless anticipation over how things might finally be once he was ready to give himself to her. But this wasn't how it was supposed to go at all. Now it felt like everything was gone. It was two steps forward, a hundred steps back.

Unable to rouse herself from bed even when the sun was high the sky, she told a concerned Bodahn and Mother that she wasn't feeling well and to send any visitors away. She had no need of the city since making her fortune in the Deep Roads. It was the city who needed her. But they would just have to go without their errand girl for a day. Maybe two days, she thought. Shit, maybe all of them. Maybe it was time she withdrew from the throngs of people who looked to her to solve their problems, and took care of herself for a while.

But as the sun descended and the sky turned dark she crawled out of bed and stood at her window, feeling deeply restless and jittery. The despair and desperation that had soaked her bed with tears had now turned to anger, but she found it disappointingly hard to hold onto. Fenris didn't know that so many of his memories would surface when he paced at her door the evening before, waiting to finally take her. She couldn't really blame him for something he didn't know would happen. She could blame him for cowardice, for not having the balls to face his feelings and to let her help. But she couldn't even begin to imagine the torment he felt over the events of his life, the fear he would feel at finally learning what it was he had lost.

She wondered what he was thinking, feeling, in his own mansion just blocks away. He was probably as full of anguish as she was, or even more and for many more reasons.

So she stole out into the dark night, and walked to his mansion, but stopped herself at knocking on his door. A dim light flickered in one of the windows, and she watched it for a time, waiting to see the movement of any shadow.

But there was nothing to see.

She gave it a week before venturing back to Anders' door, this time stone sober and ready to do whatever might be needed to repair their friendship.

"Hawke! Good to see you. You are well, I hope?" he greeted her with a warm smile.

"I am Anders, thank you. You?"

"Oh you know, trying to orchestrate a revolutionary uprising, hiding out from the Templar menace and healing the sick, injured and stupid. All in a normal day's work around here." he said with a smile.

She smiled back relieved at his easy banter. He turned to put a small pot of salve into the hands of an old woman with wispy grey hair.

"Here you go Dina, this should last a week or two if you use it sparingly." he told her as he took her arm and helped her as she hobbled toward the door.

"Actually, Hawke, I'm glad you're here. I have a favor to ask you." he said as he strode back through the now empty clinic.

"Name it." she said.

"Hm. Would you like to join me at The Hanged Man for a pint? I can explain there."

"Lead the way," she responded.

"No no, ladies first." he said sweeping his arm toward the door. "Besides, I need to lock up."

The Hanged Man was as hopping as ever, and she nodded to Varric and Isabela who sat at a full table and were too deeply ensconced in what looked to be a very serious game of Wicked Grace to do more than nod back.

She and Anders took their mugs over to a small table in a corner of the tavern and sat across from each other. It was a relief to Hawke how they slipped right back into their usual ease of communication despite the events of the evening a week prior. Anders had always proved himself to be a compassionate man, sometimes to a fault, but his immediate and unquestioning forgiveness made her feel conflicted. She didn't want him to think that she was the sort of person who regularly propositioned people, or who attempted to recover from the rejection of one man by jumping into the arms of another. She wanted to explain, wanted to be sure his opinion of her, his respect for her, hadn't been damaged by her foolish, impulsive actions.

But she had also been trying to ignore the fact that she had woken in the night several times, alone in her own bed and wishing to have his arms around her again. All they had done in their evening together was sleep, but in the few moments she had woken in his bed his arms seemed to knowingly tighten around her, never loosening or pulling away. She found such deep and unexpected comfort there that the memory of it was hard to escape. But of this, she planned to speak nothing.

Though most of her memory of that night was blurred, she had flashes of his dark eyes looking into her from behind his cage of loosed hair. The lingering image was a sharp contrast to his easygoing appearance before her now, hair fully reined in within its usual band at the back of his head.

"So, I was thinking that it might do you some good to have a change of scenery." Anders began as he sipped at his mug. "And I happen to need to take a trip out to Hercinia." he said.

Hawke immediately liked the idea. A trip outside the city would be a refreshing change of pace and might help her to clear her head a bit. Since arriving at the docks four and a half years ago she hadn't set foot outside of Kirkwall, and had never been anywhere else within the Free Marches. She had been giving Fenris all the space he could wish, but that was especially difficult with his home in such close and accessible proximity to hers. It was always there, pulling her mind to the familiar and beloved body inside, to the struggles he was enduring that he had rejected her help with. Some physical distance might help her gain mental distance as well.

"Yes, let's go." she said without hesitation.

Anders laughed, "you haven't even heard why I need to go yet."

"Okay, why are we travelling to Hercinia Anders? And when are we leaving?"

He smiled warmly at her, and began "I have received a letter from an old contact of mine who has just come into port there. He has spoken to a man there, a former Templar who has fled the Order, who claims to have Seeker documents that contain some very interesting information, including the mentioning of a ritual capable of reversing Tranquility."

"Really?" Hawke said incredulously. "Could that be true?"

"My contact, Sylvan, says that he was skeptical about it, but now there are Seekers that have come into town who are searching for this former Templar. They seem to be incredibly concerned about something he has in his possession."

"Well then we must go quickly, shouldn't we? We must try to reach him before the Seekers do, if they haven't already."

"My thoughts exactly. Sylvan says the man has a small group of apostates who are helping him hide in an underground bunker just outside the city, but his days there are numbered. Soon he will probably either flee again, or be found."

"How long will it take us to get to Hercinia?"

"If we get horses and travel with the bare minimum of stops we might be able to reach Hercinia in four days time, though I have never been there before, so that is just my estimation."

"Who else do you want to come along?"

"Actually I was hoping it would be just us." he said. "We could get in and out of places more quickly and with less attention. Bringing a dwarf or an elf will surely attract notice, and Aveline wouldn't be able to leave the guard for that amount of time anyway. Besides, we can't take the chance that anyone might learn what is in these documents before we get to them." he said. "I know our companions are trustworthy, but all it takes is one mindless comment…"

"Could it be true Anders? What would it mean if it was?" she asked, her mind racing with possibilities. "What would this mean for the mages? What kind of a backlash would it create from the Templars and the Seekers?"

"I'll be honest, I am skeptical that it is true at all. This is why I want to see them for myself."

"So we leave tomorrow," she said.

"Yes. I knew I could count on you." he said as his face lit up with a warm smile. "We should get as early a start as possible. I know a way out of the city to the north via the sewers, and then we should stick close to the mountains and camp whenever necessary," said Anders.

At the end of her second pint, she began to feel the warm familiar tipsiness spreading throughout her body, loosening muscles that she had been holding tensely and helping her laughter come easier and easier. She was excited about the trip, about the chance to seek something that could be very meaningful, instead of the routine mediation and mercenary duties that normally filled her day. Anders too seemed to be in very good spirits as well, even as his mind was clearly a little preoccupied. He informed Varric about their trip, giving few details but making it clear it was to attend to some very important business. Anders and Varric were sitting companionably and shooting lighthearted barbs back and forth to each other when Hawke said her goodbyes, promising to meet Anders outside his clinic at dawn the next morning.

Taking the quickest possible routes, it took about an hour to walk to her home in High Town, but as had become her habit she first walked past Fenris' house. This time instead of loitering about on the street outside his window, she let herself in.

Her heart quickened as she made her way through the spacious foyer and back to the room he had designated his quarters. Even before she reached him, she heard him grumbling to himself, deeply involved in some one sided conversation. He was on the ground, sharpening his greatsword in front of the fire. The pile of broken glass in the corner had grown substantially since the last time she had been there. When he finally heard her approach, he turned swiftly, brows furrowed in a grimace. But when their eyes locked his expression softened and he stood.

"Decided to actually come in this time instead of just mill about in the street?" he said. The words would have stung if his tone hadn't been so gentle

"I guess stealth isn't my strong suit after all." she said.

"Well you're quite good when you're actually trying." he answered. "It's clear that you haven't been." He walked over to the wooden table and pulled out a chair, motioning for her to come sit. He took his usual position at the head of the table, where numerous wine bottles were set off to the side, waiting for their turn to join the pile of broken glass.

She walked nervously across the room and sat. It was the chair she had spent so many hours in, listening to him talk, exploring each other's histories and getting to know each other.

"I have been wondering if you were ever going to speak to me again. I am glad you're here." he said.

"If you wanted to speak sooner, you knew where to find me."she answered.

"That is the truth. I have almost come to you a few times." he said, and Hawke's heart fluttered for a brief moment, until she squashed down any budding feelings of hope.

"We haven't gone this long without speaking since the day we met. I have… missed our conversations." he said.

Hawke sat silently, hoping he would continue.

"Do you have any jobs coming up? I have been cooped up in here since…" he stopped and sighed heavily. "I feel like a caged animal. It would be nice to have a mission to focus on for a change. Things are so much simpler in battle."

"No one forced you to stay cooped up in here Fenris."

"I know but… it hasn't been easy for me since that night. I can't stomach the thought of being around other people, having them talk to me and act so blighted normal. What am I to say to them when they flit about and whine about their petty troubles? No one here understands, or has any idea... You were the only one that really understood. But I have ruined that too." he said. "I am sure it has not been easy for you either. For that I am sorry."

"I still understand." she said honestly. That doesn't mean she had to like it, she thought to herself. But she did understand that he had been attempting to deal with more than he was able. Attempting and failing.

"Do you?" he asked, "Do you think you might… I mean, will you start coming around again?"

"I think… I still need some more time." Hawke felt her breath quicken as the emotions from their last night rose steadily up into her throat. Here he was before her now, his eyes so full of hope, looking so much the way he had before she found him in her hall, and it was abundantly clear that despite the pain he caused her that night, her feelings for him had not changed. She wanted more than anything to go to him and pull his face to hers, to feel the warmth of his skin and clutch him to her, to burrow herself into his chest and stay there.

"That night, Fenris, I..." she began figuring she might as well let it all out, but he stood abruptly and walked back over to the fire. She bit back the words she was going to say and sank down into her chair, letting go of any hope that she might get some resolution from him. She reached over to the open bottle of wine on his table and drank deeply from it, again and again, until only drops remained. Then she threw it full force against the wall, and the silence of the room was shattered with the cascading sounds of the crashing glass.

She heard Fenris move, but did not turn to look at him. She sat silently in her chair, readying herself to leave. He could tell her all about his feelings, but Maker forbid she might need to discuss hers.

She stood and said, "I am leaving town tomorrow for a little while."

His footsteps got louder until he stood before her, but she kept her eyes down on the table. "I am accompanying Anders to Hercinia to seek a man who might have some important information."

He swallowed audibly and shifted his weight on his feet.

"May I join you?" he asked finally.

"No." she answered deciding not to offer him an explanation regarding why. "I'll be back in two weeks, give or take. I just wanted to let you know, in case you needed anything in that time. I will not be in Kirkwall." She dragged her gaze up to his face finally. The hopeful, sad look in his eyes made her want to cry, and she felt the ache growing around her heart, the stinging returning to her eyes. It took almost more effort than she had within her not to reach out and touch his face. She looked away quickly, casting her eyes about for something else.

"Please come back safely." he whispered.

She nodded, swallowing the lump in her throat.

He slid a finger under her chin and gently tilted her face up so that she was looking at him again. She found herself desperately hoping he would kiss her. She tried not to look at his lips, at the perfect cupids bow mouth that for one night had delivered upon her some of the most soul shattering kisses she had ever felt.

"If you need me for anything, I remain at your service." he said, his voice cracking softly. "And even if you don't, I will continue to hope for your visits." He lingered before her, his large green eyes sweeping palpably across her face. For a brief second she thought that maybe he would kiss her after all, but then he stepped back and retreated sulkily to the fire.

"If you do encounter trouble in your travels, send a message and I will find you."


	2. Chapter 2

"Why so quiet Hawke?" Anders asked as they trotted their horses toward the hazy blue silhouettes of the Vimmark mountains.

"Sorry. I was just enjoying the silence," she said." You don't get this level of quiet in Kirkwall, unless you're about to be attacked. I suppose that could be the case now, but I am choosing to believe it isn't. I choose silence, and peace."

Anders laughed. "You like the quiet? I would have pegged you as someone who preferred chaos." He said.

"That might be true some of the time, but not all." She answered. "Variety is the spice of life and all that."

"Riiiight. Variety." He said.

"Yes. You can never truly appreciate what you have until you experience its opposite, or close." She said. "Or at least that's what they say."

"Never say never."

She snorted. "Okay, so maybe you can appreciate it, but it's not the same. The value goes up when you know precisely how much you have to lose."

"And you don't think you could just know the value?" he asked. "I mean, I agree with you. But you have to have something worth losing first. Things aren't automatically great just because it's what you happen to have." He answered.

"Obviously. But it goes either way, doesn't it? You wouldn't necessarily know how miserable you are until you have tasted happiness. "

"But so what are you saying? That we should all run out and sample the things that are different from what we are used to, for the sole purpose of finding out if it's what we really want to keep around?" he said, his tone teasingly indignant. "Well, I mean… I guess that does make a certain kind of sense. But it's not always going to be correct." He said.

Hawke laughed deeply. "No, certainly not with everything…" she said. "But, if you're not sure about something, what better way is there to find out?"

"It could be dangerous. You jeopardize the ability to come back to whatever it was that you had, that you thought you were so discontented with."

"Yes, you do." Hawke wasn't exactly sure what they even were referring to now.

"I think trusting ourselves when we are sure about something is also important. Why take an unnecessary risk?" he asked.

"Agreed. So then is it all about simply deciding what it and isn't a necessary risk?"

"Well sure. Necessary risks are a fact of life. We all face them regularly." He said "What was your last necessary risk, Hawke?"

She searched her memory, and found too many things to answer.

"Every little thing I can think of seems like it is a risk in one way or another. Every time I walk out my front door is a risk… every time I light a fire to keep myself warm. Every time I eat food prepared by someone I don't know. Or even someone I do know."

"Yes," he said. "A hard question to answer without miles of lists."

"Do you know yours?"

"Well this, obviously. More specifically, my asking that it just be the two of us. It's a risk to bring more people, most especially the colorful characters YOU keep around, but if it's just the two of us, I might also be endangering you. Especially if Justice makes an appearance."

"Well I can take care of myself. And I knew the risks too, so it's not all on you. It is a burden we are sharing, and an important one." She said, she saw his head turn to look at her but she didn't meet his eyes. "I am happy to shoulder this with you, my dear friend. I might not be a mage, but I know what is at stake." She said.

"You are too good to me." He said quietly. "If anything were to happen to you, I don't know how I would live with myself. The entirety of Kirkwall would be significantly poorer."

"Nonsense. I could die any day, for any reason and there is no one who could stop that." She said. "Also, you deserve every good thing that there is."

Anders had no retort to that, and they settled together into a comfortable silence, with only the clomping of horse hooves and the shrill cries of birds to accompany them. It was a remarkably beautiful day. Or, she thought to herself, perhaps it was just a completely normal day, except that normal days were impossible to enjoy when enclosed on all sides by a dirty, noisy, stinking city.

"You know I do feel a little exposed out here in only my plainclothes." She said eventually. "I understand we need to look normal, but I don't remember the last time I wore even my lightest leathers."

"You'd think you'd relish the chance to get out of those things. I do. Those mages robes provide very little defense anyway. Mostly it's all wards."

"Could you put some wards on our plainclothes, then? Just so that we have something between us and an arrow through the heart?"

"I don't know many. Most of the robes come with the wards, so we don't really need to know them ourselves. I think I know a basic defense ward though. And I know one to help us be more inconspicuous, so we won't stand out in crowds."

"Those sound quite useful." She said.

"Alright, whenever we stop then. I guess I should have thought of this earlier."

"So, mages robes are just… robes? There's no actual armor in there at all?"

"That's right, with magic woven in. But that can be removed, and then they are just plain old robes. And they get hot! Always getting caught on chairs and branches. One time I walked around for an hour with part of a hornet's nest stuck to the train of my robe. I had traveled through a field to retrieve some herbs and didn't notice that one of the nearby felled trees was buzzing with wasps. The worst part is how long it was until someone bothered to tell me. Here I was thinking I was being followed around by a swarm of yellow jackets." He laughed.

"How rude!" Hawke agreed.

"I know! They were all laughing. It's a good thing I didn't get stung. Can you imagine watching a mage desperately trying to zap hundreds of wasps? All the other mages in the circle might have died of laughter."

"How kind of you to consider them dying of laughter rather than worry about you dying of a hundred wasp stings."

"Oh I am no bleeding heart my darling." Anders said, "Dying of laughter is a painful business. You might as well be suffocating."

At this Hawke began to laugh herself, starting with an unstoppable giggle, that grew into deep breathless whoops and cackles. She couldn't seem to stop herself from picturing a person laughing so hard they ceased to breathe, even as she was practically experiencing it herself. Whatever could do that must have been very funny indeed. It certainly could be from a mage trying to shoot a hundred tiny bolts of lightning at a swarm of attacking bugs. Both of the situations just seemed to be hilarious. Anders joined in and just made it worse, each of them infecting the other with a contagious fit. She roared with laughter until her cheeks and stomach began to ache, but she couldn't seem to keep the laughter down. It just kept bubbling back up despite the aching. Finally she took some deep breaths and forced herself to regain her composure.

"I see what you mean!" she finally gasped, wiping the tears out of her eyes.

"Are you alright?" Anders asked, beaming at her.

She took a few deep breaths and tried to calm herself. "For now." She said. "By the way that was all your fault." She joked. "Be glad you don't have my death on your head."

He snorted.

An hour passed before they came upon a stream. The mountains were closer now, with the outlines of jagged crevices and rising peaks clearly visible. The stream ran from the direction of a distant white peak ahead of them. She wondered then if they might see snow on their trip.

"We should let the horses drink. And I can put up some wards for protection." Said Anders, and Hawke nodded her agreement.

They dismounted and set the horses by the water, and Anders turned to face her.

"Okay, let me think, let me think…. Wards, wards, wards… I know they taught us this." He said, his face looking pained and full of an exaggerated effort.

Hawke watched him talk to himself with an amused expression. Anders was so cute when he got a little silly.

"Wait! Yes! No! Wait. Okay, I think I've got it. Okay. Yes. Just stand still, stand there and, um, I'm going to have to… lay my hands on you. In places. So, be prepared for that." He said. Hawke relaxed her body.

He took a second to center himself, and then began to chant something low and quiet as he ran his hands along her arms, up toward her shoulders. He went around her back and down her legs, moving around to her front.

Then he came back up her shins, knees and thighs. His touch on the outside of her clothes was soft, almost nonexistent, and it raised a ticklish shiver on the skin under the fabric, but the ease with which she felt such a light touch drove home just how little protection the clothes offered compared to her leathers. Hands moving so lightly over her thick suits would only be felt if a decent amount of pressure was applied. But Anders' soft movements could have practically been on her bare flesh. Despite that, she still felt mostly comfortable, light and loose.

She hoped the wards would hold, and would be effective since it would be all they had. Anders hadn't even brought his staff, though Hawke had a short bow, and two of her smallest daggers.

Slowly he worked his way up her stomach, pulling his hands off her completely as they passed around her breasts, coming back down to rest for a moment over her heart. She felt a low frequency throb emanating from his hands as they lingered there, and for the briefest moment she would have sworn that the throb and her heartbeats synced up in perfect time. Then he continued up, his hands a light caress over her neck, coming to rest on her face and then over the top of her head to sweep her hair back.

She was face to face with him when he did it, his eyes closed and his lips moving almost imperceptibly with the whispered chant. She noticed small freckles on his cheeks, and a silver hair hidden within the brown stubble on his square chin. She decided she wouldn't mention that there was no clothes on her head for him to place a ward.

He then shook out his arms and took a few steps back. Starting the chant back at the beginning, he leaned over and began running his hands up his own legs, passing over his stomach and reaching around to as much of his clothing as his arms could find. Hawke stifled a laugh as she noticed how much it resembled taking a shower. But then the laugh turned into something else entirely when she found herself actually picturing Anders in the shower.

The mages robes and adventurer gear he'd always worn had done little to show off Anders' physical assets. With him in a set of light cotton plainclothes, she could see the gentle swells of toned muscles on his chest and his arms, shoulders that looked much broader than she had realized, and a taut, slender torso. The pants that he had chosen to wear hung attractively from lean hips and well proportioned buttocks. He was the same Anders from the neck up, but from there down had the surprisingly strong, healthy body of a man who worked and battled in equal measure.

When they were galloping away from the stream, it occurred to Hawke how little she had thought of Fenris that day. But once she had opened the door in her mind to him, he would not leave. After five weeks of not seeing or speaking to him, laying her eyes upon him again was like coming up for air after floundering for days underwater. He at least didn't want them to part ways completely. She hadn't always seen eye to eye with Fenris, particularly on the subject of magic, but no matter how much they disagreed he had never given her the impression that he would abandon their friendship over their differences in opinion. A fact which she initially barely believed could be true based on how vehemently he would spar with anyone over the dangers of mages.

But he wanted her to come back again, like old times, if they could be called that already. He missed their conversations.

Of course he did, she told herself. She is the only one who really talks to him, the only one who will let him ramble on and on and will actually listen to it all. Fenris would often get bored of talking about himself and begin asking questions about her, showing a true interest in her thoughts and feelings on numerous topics, but if she wasn't there for him to vent to, to purge his mind to, then she didn't know if he would have anyone else. Would he just leave, then, the way he had so many other places? Just continue to be a ghost, wandering from place to place, putting down no roots and establishing no real connections?

Hawke knew that no matter how Fenris might shy away from the more intense aspects of love, she was the deepest connection he had made with anyone since fleeing Danarius, and probably well before that.

He needed her.

"Well, look at that." Anders said when they came across the lights of a distant village, situated right at the base of the mountain. "There is a town in our camping spot."

"Do you think they'd let us set up our tent in the tavern yard?" she asked jokingly.

"Probably, but then we'd spend the evening getting pissed on."

"Well at least we'll be close to the wine." She agreed.

"I guess we might as well get a room then. Or two, if you'd prefer." He said.

"Seems a bit of a waste of coin to get two." She said and he nodded. "Plus it wouldn't be safe being separated in such an unfamiliar place."

"Well, on we go." He said as he urged the horse forward.

They were at a much higher elevation now than they were back in Kirkwall, and when Hawke had yawned she felt her ears pop. The air held a brisk chill and she rubbed her arms, reminding herself to place her coat at the top of her pack when they left the next morning, so that it was easy to reach if things got too cold.

The town was small, consisting of only several scattered homes and structures, but the tavern sat right in the middle with a hanging lantern outside the door, just like every tavern in every town she had ever been in. They tied up their horses at a hitching post and Hawke followed Anders into the dimly lit building.

It wasn't exactly a scene in which every head turned their direction the moment they walked in the door, but she did meet the curious staring eyes of almost every single person there while on the walk up to the bar.

Anders quietly secured a room for the night, and ordered two plates of food and a bottle of wine, which they carried up the stairs and down a dark and narrow hall.

"The last door on the right…" Anders muttered as they made their way to the dead end.

The key worked on the door, and he banged his foot as he felt around the dark room for the lantern, which turned out to be conveniently placed on a small table right inside the door.

It illuminated a room that was tiny, with one window, one small table and two chairs and a single bed. There wasn't so much as a rug or a cask of water about beyond that.

"No wonder it was so cheap." He said.

Setting the food and wine bottle down on the table, they dropped their packs in a heap in the one open corner of the room and both stood looking at the tiny bed.

"He said this was the last room." She said.

"I find that hard to believe." Anders replied. "How many people are honestly traveling through this town tonight?"

Hawke shrugged.

"You can have the bed. I'll sleep on the floor." Anders said.

"Where exactly? There is barely enough room for us to even stand here, much less for you to try and lie down."

"No matter. I'll figure something out."

"Absolutely not." Hawke answered. "If anyone should sleep on the floor, it should be me. I am much smaller than you so I would fit down there better. Maybe if I removed my legs, or squeezed my head under the bed." She said as she tilted her head, trying to appraise the floor from a different angle.

Anders laughed.

"We have slept in the same bed before. We'll just have to get close again." She said, the thought making her stomach flutter.

She thought she saw a small blush creeping over Anders' face, but he only looked at the bed, his eyes appearing slightly glassy, and then turned to the food.

They sat together at the table, eating their wedges of bread and mutton and drinking the wine straight from the bottle when she noticed the serious expression on Anders' face.

"Thinking about the documents?" Hawke asked. He nodded.

"To become Tranquil you must completely sever your spirit's connection to the fade. I just can't fathom anything that could restore that once it's been done." He said. "I am not optimistic that we will find anything that can truly reverse tranquility."

"But there must be something in those documents, if the Seekers have been sent out. Or, are Seekers always sent out when a Templar deserts the order?"

"Maybe. I suppose it could just be that, though Sylvan specifically mentioned that they were asking about the documents. No, it doesn't matter; they could just be a recipe for peach jam and I would still need to see them."

Hawke sighed at the thought of peach jam. She hadn't had that since her days in Lothering, years before the blight.

"Does your contact know the apostates who are hiding him? Will he be able to get us to them?" she asked.

"That much is unclear." He answered.

When the inevitable moment arrived that they were to climb into the bed, they both stood there nervously, removing the outer layer of their clothes.

Anders paused in his undressing and asked, "Should I keep mine on?"

"Please don't. You're covered in dust and the cuffs of your pants have inexplicably gotten muddy," she answered. "Did I miss the part where we ran through a field of mud?"

He snickered.

"Fine. Ask and ye shall receive." He said as he dropped his pants. "Thankfully I don't make a habit of going commando, like some of the mages in the Circle did."

"Did they really?"

"Yes, easier access to the goods in those rushed, private moments." he smiled, eyes twinkling mischieviously.

"Were there a lot of those?"

"Of course. You lock a bunch of people up in a tower together for years and that stuff is going to happen. All we had in the world was each other. And, as you know, humans have needs." He pulled his hair out of its ponytail and shook it loose. It fell down in his face and Hawke felt the flutter in her stomach again.

"Yes, I suppose it would be much stranger if things like that didn't happen," she said as she folded her clothes up. She left on her undergarments and put on a light shirt that reached to her mid-thigh. He too retained a shirt, and a pair of undershorts. "Sounds sort of romantic though. Secret rendezvous and rushed trysts and all that."

"Romantic? Yes, I supposed for a few it probably was. Until the Templars found out and did everything in their power to keep them apart, or made their lovers watch while the other was punished." He said. "Mostly it was all a game. It was just safer that way. People cared about each other of course, but love was dangerous. It made you weak, vulnerable."

"How sad." Hawke said. She climbed onto the furthest side of the bed, up against the wall, leaving the other half of the bed as open as she could manage.

"Did you have anyone there?"

"I had a few dalliances. There was one person that I came to care about a bit, but it wasn't love, and it didn't last." He said, as he slid into the bed beside her. They were squeezed tight together and he raised his arm to allow her to get under it. She settled into the crook of his body the same way she had back in his room that night in Kirkwall. She almost groaned at how soothing it was to be up against his warm body again. She rested her head on his shoulder, and found herself savoring his subtle but comforting scent.

"Do you love Fenris?" he asked her finally as he waved his fingers toward the lantern, sending over an icy chill to extinguish the flame within, draping the room in darkness.

"Yes. I do." She answered.

"I still don't understand why." He said.

"No, I don't imagine you would be able to. No one sees how different he is when it is just the two of us."

"But do you want to be with a man who behaves in ways no one else could understand? Who you would have to explain to everyone? Or has he gotten softer since the last time I have seen him? If anyone could tame the man, it's you."

"Well…" she began. She was holding onto the hope that Fenris would return to her, but didn't know how likely that would be. She certainly didn't feel she had tamed him. "The fact is, I guess I'm not really with him anymore. I don't think anyway. The one night we had… he walked out. So it doesn't really matter now."

"Right. You did say that before, didn't you." he said. "But wait, you think? You're not sure?"

"He had flashes of lost memories return while we were…together. It upset him. He said it was too much for him and he was sorry and then he left."

"I see. What a blighted fool." Anders said. "And did you think that was your fault?"

"Not exactly. I don't really think it is either of our fault. It just… it is what it is."

"But he obviously hurt you. I could kill him for that." he asked as his arm tightened around her.

"I guess this is what I get for liking the complicated ones." She said.

"So have you really never loved anyone Anders?" she asked, raising her face to try to see his in the dark.

"I wouldn't say that." He answered quietly.

She slid a hand up to his chest, and lay it over his heart. She felt it beating strong under her hand and she closed her eyes. She felt safe, secure there beside him.

"The night you showed up at my door…" he began, "You scared me a little bit."

"I'm sorry. I am sorry about that whole night."

"Yes, you keep apologizing. But there's no need to. Had you been trying to hurt yourself?" he asked. "With the fight and the blood... and then, with me?" Her breath caught in her throat and her mind began to race. To whom could she confide if not in Anders?

"Yes."

"Over Fenris?"

"I don't know. I guess Fenris was just…. The straw that broke the camel's back."

"I think I understand the urge." He said. "No, I know I do. I am sorry you had to feel that too."

She recalled the two words he had uttered that had echoed through her mind countless times since that night. Two words inviting her to ruin him. Two words that had summed up so much inside her that she didn't know how to speak. "Hurt me." He must have understood. He had to, to say something like that.

She nestled closer into him, and felt his body return the movement. She exhaled a deep, shaky breath and felt the day's tension bleed out from her limbs.

"Do you believe a person can love two people at the same time?" she asked.

"I don't know. Probably." He almost whispered. "But even if you truly love two, you'd eventually have to choose just one."


	3. Chapter 3

When the first light of the morning changed the color of the room from black to blue, Hawke was no longer just settled into the nook between Anders' arm and his body. The fog of sleep subsided slowly, she found herself enjoying the feeling of being completely wrapped up in and around him, her leg draped across his thighs, the comforting weight of him resting against her. His arms surrounded her, bare flesh against hers. She opened her eyes but didn't move, letting her head rise and fall with his chest as he breathed. She wished she could have had a morning like this with Fenris. She had thought about it countless times over the past few years, imagining his resting face under that mop of silvery hair, muscles shimmering with their delicate markings. It had been all she wanted for so long.

But here with Anders was nice too. She moved her head slightly, so she could look up at him in the dim morning light, and she saw his hair splayed over his pillow, his lips parted and the soft wisp of his lashes against his cheek. He slept completely silently, radiating an unnatural peace. She moved her hand up to caress his hair, running her fingers through it and letting them rest within its cool, soft nest. She wished he would wear it down more often.

He was a beautiful man, she thought as she gazed at his face. Kind, passionate, generous and always trying to help others and do the right thing. It was just like him to invite a spirit on the brink of death to share his body so that it might be saved. Or operate a clinic for refugees and never ask for a dime of payment. Her eyes fell upon the soft pillows of his lips and she wondered what it would be like to kiss him. Would he be gentle and tender? Or would he kiss with the same sort of fiery passion that emerged when he spoke about the abolishment of the circle?

His eyelids began to twitch and flick around, his eyes casting about under their lids with the beginnings of dream. Hawke wondered what sorts of things he dreamed about. She moved her hand back to his chest and rested her chin upon it, content to just watch his face until the sun was fully up and they had to leave their warm, private haven. Occasionally she remembered that the whole length of her was pressed against him and it awakened a pool of warmth below her belly. She had to resist the temptation to slide her leg in between his and writhe against him, turning their sleepy embrace into something less innocent. She wanted to badly, the desire for it pulsing through her. But she held it back. She was sure Anders wouldn't decline her, but their trip had only just begun and they still had a long way to go. She decided it probably was not the best course of action to throw them both into confusion, especially since her heart was still firmly fixated on Fenris.

Fenris. Despite all her appreciation and admiration of Anders, Fenris was still the one her hopes were set on. It hurt her heart to think of Anders as a simple place-holder for the moody elf, and she rejected the thought as quickly as it came. Anders did not deserve to be toyed with. He did not deserve to be teased and strung along by someone whose heart belonged to someone else. Anders should have pure, true love that is given to him completely, without hesitation or complications. She could have been the one to give that to him. But it was too late to do so right now. She wondered if her presence in his life was keeping him from finding someone who could.

His head moved, grabbing her focus again, and she heard the slightest groan rumbling low in his throat. She wondered how Justice affected his dreams. Did Justice ever sleep, or was he in there now, perfectly aware of Hawke and of their whole mission? His body twitched and his head rolled, his face flickering with an expression that indicated whatever dream he was having was taking an unpleasant turn. Anders' brows furrowed, and he let out a whimper as his head thrashed over to rest on its other cheek. His breathing intensified, and the twitching of his body came more forcefully and frequently. Hawke began scooting up the bed so that she was level with his head.

She caressed his hair and put her lips to his ear.

"It's okay. It's just a dream. You're safe. You're free. Everything is okay." She whispered. She slid an arm under his neck so she could cradle his head, and his eyes snapped open. It was difficult to read his expression in the still dim room, but he looked about for a moment, blinking the dream out of his mind, and turned to quietly gaze into her face. "You were just having a dream." She whispered while she gently combed her fingers through the hair along his temples. He turned and wordlessly pulled her to him, burying his face in her neck, pressing his nose and lips against the flesh of her throat. She lay her head upon his, wrapping herself around him again and continuing to caress his hair the way he had done hers their first night together. He took a few shaky breaths, and fell silent and still once again.

Their second day of travel was cold and gray, the sky overcast with a thick layer of milky clouds. They pushed their horses to travel faster than the day before, seeming to hope that it would help the day itself move faster too.

"Does Justice talk to you?" Hawke asked, her question cutting through the second consecutive hour of silence.

"Well we are not exactly separate anymore. It's more that I feel… his reactions, his feelings."

"And you can distinguish them from your own?"

"Most of the time, but not always. It is easier to tell when he disagrees with me about something. But it gets harder and harder as time goes on. And sometimes I lose chunks of time, blanks in my memory of things. That never used to happen until about the last year or so." Anders said.

"Really?" she asked, feeling a chill run up her spine. "You lose time? And don't know what you've been doing? How long are the chunks that you lose?"

He nodded, face looking as serious as she had ever seen it. "Twenty, thirty minutes. It can be difficult to gage. One time I blinked and the night went from sunset to pitch dark."

"That sounds longer than twenty or thirty minutes."

"Yes, that was the only time that I know of where that much time was lost."

"That is frightening."

"Very much so. I fear that eventually Justice might just take over completely. It is already escalating, and that is the inevitable result."

She dropped her questions then, and let the day continue on. When she wasn't contemplating the future of Anders and Justice, her mind was with Fenris. She was filled with so many questions about whether it was worth it to hold onto him. He said he couldn't be with her, so what loyalty did she really owe him now? If she wanted to kiss Anders, then by all rights she should be able to. What was stopping her was the fact that Fenris was still so prevalent in her mind. She supposed the fate of their relationship would depend upon him, with what he said or didn't say to her once she returned. How long was she willing to wait? In the meantime, she couldn't deny how much she cherished the time spent in Anders' arms.

Once the gray of the sky began to deepen, Anders stopped his horse and surveyed a small valley.

"We are going to lose the light completely soon. I think we should probably set up camp." He said. "If only we didn't have these clouds, then we'd have another hour or two. But they haven't broken all day."

She walked her horse over to a tree and dismounted, tying up the horse and attaching a feedbag to his bridle.

Hawke took in the landscape around her. It was bare and ugly, with brown fields of dried grass that were dotted with black rocky boulders and spindly pine trees. There was no sign of civilization in any direction and the imposing slope of the looming mountains cast cold shadows around them.

"No town conveniently parked in our camping spot this time." She said. "It's a shame. It's going to be a cold night in the tent."

Anders had no response. He had been unusually quiet the whole day, ever since they had climbed out of bed and changed clothes with their backs turned to each other that morning. Her mind raced with worries about what was bringing him down, whether she had done or said something that upset him. She assumed it must have been from her questions about Justice, as his mood did seem to worsen after that conversation. Or maybe it was the way she was clinging to him when he woke that morning. Was it cruel of her to allow that? Was she still teasing him? Maybe it was the dream he had.

After the tent was up and the fire was started she walked up to position herself directly in front of him, so that he had to acknowledge her. She watched his face with concerned eyes and asked,

"Are you okay?"

He kicked at the ground while he considered her question quietly.

"No. Not really." He answered.

"Can I help?" she asked.

"No. No one can." He said.

She took his hand and pulled him toward the fire.

"Come, warm up and talk to me."

They sat on the icy ground and she waited for him to speak as she watched the flames crackle and lick the air.

"Was it my questions about Justice?" she asked eventually.

He sighed heavily, his shoulders sinking forward, hands coming up to squeeze his brow. "It's not your fault, Hawke. But I do feel more and more like I am running out of time." He said. "Like if I was going to do anything meaningful with my life before I disappear, then it had better happen before it is too late."

"But that is sort of what we are doing, right? We are on our way to something that could be very meaningful." She said as she began to pull a packet of jerky and nuts from her pack, dividing up the foods between the two of them.

"But we don't know what we'll find there, if anything. I hope we do. I hope we find something that will expose the treachery of the Order once and for all."

"Let us hope for that then." She said as she picked through dried fruits. "Are you really so sure that you are going to… disappear?" she asked.

"I couldn't be more certain. My life is mostly over already. If Justice isn't the end of me then the Templars will be. I have already escaped the Circle six times. There won't be a seventh, whether that's my doing or theirs."

"Six times!?" she asked, shocked. Her heart felt heavy at his words.

He nodded. "And if the rebellion comes, _when_ it comes, I will gladly give my life to that cause. "

"Are you really so eager to be gone?" she asked.

"Part of me is. Part of me is terrified. But I am what I am, and I am not going to go back to the Circles. And I cannot undo what is done with Justice." He said. "I would kill whomever I need to if it meant freeing all the mages. But… I'm glad to be spending my last years with you Hawke." He said. His eyes were deep and sad, and wisps of his hair floated around his head in the breeze.

She found herself smoothing his hair back again, the way she had done so many times now. She leaned in closer, wanting to take him in her arms and comfort him they way she had with his bad dream that morning. This fatalistic seriousness was a side of him she hadn't seen much before and she wasn't able to think of any words that might help. She thrust the handful of dried food into his hands.

"Eat. You'll not waste away on my watch. I won't allow it." She said, and then rose to grab a bottle of wine and pull a wool blanket out of her pack.

She rejoined him on the ground, draping half the blanket around his shoulders and pulling the other half around her own. She pulled the gap in front closed and handed him the bottle of wine.

They ate their food in silence, and he turned to look at her with his eyes full, mouth poised as though something was just on the tip of his tongue.

"What is it?" she asked.

"We… we are behaving a lot like lovers. But we are not lovers." He said. She wasn't sure what to say in response, so she sat quietly. That was true, and she didn't want to stop necessarily. Though she hadn't been able to stop telling herself how much kinder it would be to him if she did.

"Do you want to be?" he asked. "Could you… I mean, you came to my door that night. You must have wanted…"

"Anders, you should have someone who can give you their whole heart." She said sadly. "I can't. I want to. But…"

"I know." His eyes were deep pools of longing and it yanked at Hawke's heart, causing her gut to ache. But part of her was also tugged back yet again to Fenris.

"But," he continued, "how about you let me decide what I should have? And what I am willing to accept?"

"You would have a woman who loves another? You are truly willing to accept that?"

"Not any woman. Just you. If you would have me in return. I've never felt for anyone what I feel for you. Even if I lived a hundred more years, I don't know if I would find this again."

Anders' face was getting closer to hers, and she was finding it impossible to pull back. The flickering light of the fire glinted off his eyes and cast a warm golden glow across his face and hair. She swallowed, feeling lost.

"Before I leave this world, I want know what it is like to love someone." He said softly. "I am not sorry Fenris walked out on you. I am sorry to say that, but it's true. I would never leave you the way he did. I would rip my own heart out before I would do that to you."

He moved in a few more inches, and she couldn't take her eyes off the attractive curl of his lips.

"Maybe you love me a little bit too. I think you do. Why else would you come to my door Hawke? I know you feel something. It is there when you hold me, and when you look at me. Like right now." He paused, his words hanging in the air. She couldn't wrench her eyes away from his face. She couldn't deny what she knew he was seeing. "I see it. I see it right now, even if you refuse to."

He stopped, and lingered just inches away. She was feeling her resolve weaken, and begin to slip away completely.

"Maybe that is why you asked last night about loving two people at the same time. What if we wait for a better time, and then it's too late? We never know what could happen." he went on. "Hawke, what if we die tomorrow? What if we never make it back to Kirkwall?"

She drew a breath, not realizing that she had been holding it. There was so much truth in the things he was saying. "But," she croaked, and then swallowed. "I don't want to hurt you Anders. I can't make you all the same promises. And if I broke your heart, that would destroy me."

"Hurt me." He whispered. "Do it quick, before the world ends."

Her breath caught in her throat again. Could he truly believe his time was so limited? What cruel God would let him live a life that was so short and devoid of love? What if they were caught, or killed, or the blight returned, or an all out war broke out between the mages and the templars, or the Qunari attacked? Knight Commander Meredith had declared assisting apostates a hangable offense, and that is exactly what she was doing, had been doing for years now. If Anders was caught, she was caught. Or if she simply woke one morning and Anders was gone? What regrets would she have?

She closed her eyes then and let her face close the tiny gap that was left between them. At first their lips barely touched. Their mouths brushed together lightly, exploring the soft fullness of each other's lips. And then he moved in closer, sliding an arm around her back and pulling on the small of her waist as he pressed his mouth more firmly to hers. She felt the world around them fall away as he opened his mouth to let her in, his breath coming shaky from his nose. She opened her eyes to see his brows drawn in an intense expression of need. He tilted his head and she slid her tongue into his mouth, touching his and tasting him. She reached up behind his head and loosed that hair of his that she loved so much, which fell down around his face. He pulled back to look at her for a moment afterward, and she saw the same vision of him as that night in his clinic, his eyes dark and full of that hunger that stirred unnameable desires in her.

She came back into the kiss again, harder this time, pulling his head to her, her other hand dropping the blanket and running lightly up his chest to his throat. She caressed the exposed skin above his collar, coming up to cup his face. A small voice in the back of her mind was crying out that she should stop, that it wasn't fair to Anders, that this might be the reason she lost Fenris forever. But she smothered it back down, and it disappeared under the gasps that were increasingly coming from Anders' throat as their kisses grew harder and more urgent.

She felt his fingertips find her face and explore her, holding onto her and steadying her head so he could press his mouth deeper and deeper into hers.

She tried to turn her body to face him, but their position on the ground was preventing her from pulling him into her the way she wanted. She maneuvered herself so that she could lay back and bring him down on top of her.

"Hawke," he breathed between kisses, and settled his body down on hers. "Anders," she whispered back. She wrapped her arms fully around him, not caring about the cold that was biting through her thin clothes. After two nights of sleeping in each other's arms, they knew each other's bodies now. She opened her legs and let him sink down between them, pressing himself hard against her. His hanging mop of hair tickled the sides of her face and she ran her fingers through it, grabbing it and kissing him again with all the force she could muster.

The wild desire she was feeling surging through her was mixed with something sad, a feeling of an impending tragedy that made her ache and rail against the world. I will not let you take him, she screamed silently to Justice, to the templars who hunted him, who would not think twice before dragging him away from the life that he had built and the people who cared about him. They would sever him from his dreams and his emotions. Take away his life. No, she thought, you will not have him. The fear it incited for him drove her body to cover every inch of his that she could reach, it fired up a desperate wish to not only give him what he was asking of her, but more. There was no going back now, was there? So maybe she would give him everything she had within her for the small time that she was able to, she thought, even if that was only this one night. Her hands found their way under his shirt and she raked her fingers down his bare back. She felt his spine arch and his hold on her tighten, his mouth devouring hers.

But underneath the fear and desire that was raging through her, remained her inescapable thoughts about Fenris. A small sliver of her mind wondered if Fenris would be angry enough to hurt Anders if he found out about them. She wondered if Fenris would refuse her forever then. Of all the people to replace Fenris with, she would choose a mage. A mage that Fenris had antagonized and made the target of many a sharp comment. Well what did you expect, Fenris? she asked his memory. You said I was different, unlike any woman you'd ever met. You said you'd never wanted anyone until me. And then you pushed me away.

And in a dark spot that ran even lower than that, down in the in the basest level of her mind, was her disgust with herself. Here a wonderful man was throwing himself at her, begging for her love, begging her to help make his last years on this earth meaningful, and she was still wondering if she could still hold onto someone else.

No, Anders knew she loved Fenris. That was no secret. And he wanted her anyway. Anders had made that decision for himself, but why did it still feel so wrong?

She needed to get him inside her, and quickly, so she could overpower all the warring fragments of her brain with something else, something loud enough that it could smother all the nagging words that were tormenting her.

She tried to sit up, and pulled him toward the tent. He followed the urging of her hands and without breaking their kiss they found their way inside the flaps. Their bedrolls were set up side by side and they fell down on top of them, Hawkes' hands quickly undoing his shirt and then pulling at it until it was gone. She shed her own clothes with Anders help, feeling his hands running over her and exploring, pulling, kneading at her flesh. His mouth moved down to her breasts and her throat, covering her in hot, open mouthed kisses.

In a quick motion she pulled his face back up to hers, and guided him between her legs, closing herself around him, encircling him with the entirety of her body.

"They will not have you." She gasped as he moved faster and faster, his bare flesh writhing against hers as his mouth explored her lips her tongue, working her into a quick frenzy and making her muscles tremble with exertion. It took what felt like only seconds before the pleasure was screaming up into her, drowning out the reproachful voices that were clawing at her soul. Everything shattered, the world disappeared and all that remained for a few suspended seconds was Anders joined to her, his hands, his arms, his thighs and his mouth, his voice crying out. A strangely pleasant buzzing was growing around them, penetrating through her, tickling through her flesh and urging her into a new explosion of pleasure. That powerful magic of his, she realized, and it seemed to want to spill out of him with a will of its own. She wondered if any of that was the spirit he shared his body with.

When she came down, the magical energy was still there, thrumming just under his skin, like touching the surface of a bridge that arced low over a rushing, crashing river.

They had fallen where they happened to be when they finished, a heap of sweaty limbs and heaving chests. His face still remained up against hers, breathing over her cheek and neck. Her lips were sore and felt swollen from the intensity of their kisses and she found herself savoring the pain, pursing her lips together so she could feel it sting.

But her mind was mostly empty and for that she was grateful. She didn't know how long it would last, when the questions would start firing off again, but she closed her eyes and clutched him tightly to her, feeling their hearts pounding hard together.

His eyes caught her attention, as they watched her face quietly. His mouth was open, and he was panting lightly, still trying to calm himself. She looked into him, spreading her hand over his cheek.

This is what you wanted isn't it? You want me to love you, to hold you while you slip away, or destroy yourself? Even though it would destroy me too? She thought the questions, but didn't say them. Instead she closed her eyes and rested her forehead against his and tried to keep all her inner voices at bay for just a little while longer.

They stayed pressed up against each other through the night, their nakedness urging them into two more lovemaking sessions even though parts of them were sore and aching. The second time she woke to Anders' kissing her neck and breathing heavily in her ear. She immediately found his lips and tightened her embrace. They made love in slow, smooth strokes, taking their time and savoring each individual part of the other's body. The lingering fog of sleep kept her mind open and empty, aware only of the smooth texture of his flesh, the hard swells of his muscles. They rolled together and she found herself on top where she rubbed her face into his neck, his hair and the soft nest of curly hair scattered over his chest. She inhaled his scent as deeply as she could, loving the light but sharp musk that was so deeply male and basic that it satisfied something wild and primal in her. She sighed as she spread herself over him, moving in a steady rhythm up a long sensory mountain.

The third time he entered her, a dim sliver of light was peeking under the flaps of the tent. It stung, her body rubbed raw from use, but she urged him in anyway. The third time wasn't about pleasure, it was about closeness. And still joined, they drifted off to sleep again before either of them had finished.

When they finally rose and exited the tent, Anders stood before her, looking at her like they were both in a dream.

He cupped her face and smiled. "I think I can die in peace now." He said. "Even if we have nothing else, we had last night. And it was everything I ever dreamed."

Then he turned to kick the cold coals of the fire and called exultantly up into the sky, "I'm ready Maker!"

She smiled but didn't feel happy, his words striking a deep chord of sadness in her heart.

Clutching his arm, she pulled him to her and kissed him again, trying to infuse the kiss with all the love she could muster, all the love that she so desperately wanted him to know. Maybe it would be enough, she thought. Maybe if she let go of Fenris and gave her heart to Anders, it might be enough to save him. To give him the strength to combat everything in this world that was trying to pull him apart.


	4. Chapter 4

**Four Months Earlier**

It was a beautiful day on the Wounded Coast, if a little hot. There was not a cloud in the sky to shade them from the sun that blazed overhead, but there was a nice breeze and birdsong filled the air. Hawke and Fenris walked at a leisurely pace along the path that would eventually lead back to Kirkwall, enjoying the satisfaction of peacefully resolved conflict. Isabela had split once she found out they were meeting some Qunari, taking Varric with her back to the Hanged Man. With Fenris along, all talks with the Qunari went as well as they possibly could, and they agreed that they didn't feel the pressing need for backup, and so happily bid goodbye to their companions.  
"Does water hurt your markings, Fenris?" Hawke asked out of the blue as they walked quietly along.  
"Water? Well, no, no more than anything else does."  
"So then, does any kind of touch hurt? I would imagine that that armor might…. But yet you wear it every day, so it can't be too bad. Though obviously I don't know how much of you is covered in the markings. Are they everywhere?"  
"They are. Not full coverage exactly, but no major body part was spared."  
Hawke found herself imagining all the possibilities. It was enough to make her cheeks grow hot.  
"And your armor doesn't hurt?" she asked.  
"No. This armor is… custom made."  
"I see. And water? You must bathe of course."  
"It can cause discomfort if it is too hot or too cold, but it depends." He said. "Touch in general doesn't always hurt, or at least it's not automatically painful. The markings are just… sensitive. But intensity of feeling does not always equate to pain."  
"Have you been swimming since you got the markings?"  
He paused a moment, caught off guard by the question. "Swimming? Yes actually. During my time with the Fog Warriors in Seheron. Now that I think about it, I remember finding immersion in water quite pleasant. But I haven't had the pleasure since. Slaves do not have access to baths. We bathe with just a bucket of water. Though I suppose that is not so different than what I do now."  
"Would you like to come swimming with me? Right now? I know a place."  
"I… Do you really think it's a good idea? We're already vulnerable out here with only the two of us."  
"We've cleared the roads as thoroughly as possible already." Hawke shrugged, "Besides, we'll have a full view so no one can sneak up on us. And with the Qunari in the hills, most troublemakers seem to have left of their own accord." She said. "Come! I so rarely get the chance to swim!" she said, feeling excitement build and put a little bounce in her step. She turned and gave Fenris a big smile, hoping he might begin to share some of her enthusiasm. They so rarely did things just for fun.  
He laughed softly. "Well how could I say no to that? Alright Hawke, lead the way."

After turning off the trail, Hawke climbed through the brush of the mountain side with Fenris close behind. She knew they had to scale a rocky ledge around to a small waterfall that ran close down the side of the mountain. At the top of that waterfall was a dammed up area that had become a pool. She located it once with Bethany, and had been itching to return to it ever since. But walking through the Wounded Coast was rarely a safe trip without a full entourage. Today was different. She felt light and happy, which was a bit of a rarity in her life as of late, and now that her mind was set on it, she was determined to have an enjoyable swim. Maker help anyone who tried to ruin it.  
Fenris went almost barefoot, as most elves did, and she noticed him slipping less and appearing more surefooted than she was as they navigated their way up the steep slope of the hill. When she found the rock ledge with the little overhang, she stopped to loosen her boots.  
"What are you doing?" Fenris asked.  
"I'm going barefoot." She responded.  
"I can see that. May I ask why?" he asked.  
"Why not? You're barefoot and seem to be doing fine."  
He snorted. "You are a strange one sometimes, Hawke."  
"I believe that is what they call the pot calling the kettle black."  
"A fine point." He said.  
"I used to run around barefoot all the time back home in Lothering. It was good for climbing trees, and I still miss feeling grass between my toes."  
Hawke found that the rest of the climb gave her no problems, other than a couple sharp rocks poking hard into the bottom of her feet. Years of wearing boots had softened her soles, but there was no way she could go barefoot in Kirkwall, with its filthy streets.  
"Does going barefoot in Kirkwall ever bother your feet?" she asked him. "I mean, those streets are full of all manner of refuse."  
"Yes, actually. I have even purchased a pair of boots. But I can never seem to wear them for longer than a few minutes. It just feels… wrong. I do not like it."  
"You dislike that more than walking through all the shit in Lowtown?"  
"Only just."  
"Hm," she said as they made their way up the final stretch."What about in battle? Does no one stomp on your toes? Seems like that should be a quick way to distract you."  
"It has been tried. It rarely succeeds." He said.  
"Interesting." She said as she stopped to look down at his toes. They were perfectly normal looking feet, but the callouses on the bottom had to be considerable. She wondered if it would be too strange a request to ask him to let her touch them.  
"Well, here we are." She said as she climbed the final steps and emerged alongside the pool.  
The crystalline water shimmered in the blazing sun, promising to be refreshing even if the heat of the day had made it warm. It was as clear as she had ever seen it, showing all the sticks and leaves that lay on the bottom in perfect detail. She walked the perimeter of the pool, peering down the rocky brush that obscured the land between the pool and the road. The stream that fed the pool cut through the rock in the side of the mountain, flowing fast through boulders and bankless shore.  
"It is peaceful up here." Fenris said as he looked over the steepest section of mountain. "This is a good vantage point. Near impossible to reach unless you know where you're going."  
Hawke began unbuckling her armor and sliding it off, piece by piece.  
"I am glad you brought me here." Fenris said, his lip curled in a little half smile. She cherished the moments she was able to remove his usual scowl from his face.  
She paused in her undressing and looked around, taking in a deep breath. The rare occasions that she was out of the city and back among the stillness of nature always seemed to feed some deep spiritual part of her. The quiet, the big expressive sky and the untamed wilderness that grew and thrived with no help from man took her back to the peaceful moments of her childhood, before she knew what evils existed in the world. If it were up to her, she would eventually find a way to spend her years in a country house, with land and a garden and the ability to sit outside and listen to wind whisper through the trees any time she chose.  
Fenris turned and flashed her what appeared to be a full and very pleased smile. She returned it happily, grateful that she finally had an opportunity to return to the pool, and that it was just the two of them. Her heart fluttered with the thought that she might finally see what beauty lay underneath his imposing armor.  
When all her own armor was off and she was only in her small clothes, she tiptoed up to the water and dipped in her foot. It was much colder than she expected it to be, but then she figured that despite the warm day, this was mountain runoff, most likely from some glacier or snow pack somewhere miles and miles away. But already her newly exposed skin was heating up from the sun's intense rays, and she knew how refreshing it would be to replace the caress of the burning sun with that of some fresh mountain water. She took a few steps back, and dove into what looked to be the deeper end of the pool.  
The pool water got even cooler the deeper she went, and she opened her eyes and kicked downward, trying to get as close as she could to the bottom. The clarity of the water had been deceptive, making it appear as though the bottom was much closer to the surface than it actually was. She kicked and kicked and only just felt her fingertips brush against the soft bed of the pool when she felt herself being pulled back up toward the surface. She let herself hang there in the water for a moment, savoring how the rushing sounds in her ears blocked out all the rest of the world. When her lungs finally started to burn with the need for breath, she kicked lazily until her head broke the surface.  
She wiped her hair back out of her eyes, and looked around for Fenris. He was sitting on the bank, in the process of removing one of his arm pieces.  
"Ahhhh…" she groaned. "It feels so good."  
Just before she took another deep breath and went back under she glanced up at Fenris' deep green eyes. All traces of his usual glowering were gone. He looked uncharacteristically relaxed and easy. She knew he could probably see her feelings for him in her eyes. "Puppy dog eyes", Merrill had called it. She didn't really try to hide it, the way she tried to drink him in at every opportunity. A creature as stunning as Fenris might have been used to that from many onlookers, but for Hawke, it was much more than just aesthetic appreciation. Her arms ached to hold him, to feel his touch against her skin. She imagined that if he ever finally kissed her, her heart just might burst from months and months of built up anticipation.  
She kicked her way back to the bottom again, counting the seconds until she reached the limits of the depths. The pool was at least as deep as three men, she figured. This time she was able to plunge a hand into the soft muck, feeling soft branches crumbling at her touch.  
She let herself float back to the top, and at some point heard the distant muffled crash of another body entering the water. She opened her eyes and tried to locate Fenris within the blur, and finally saw a pair of kicking feet and bare legs. He kept on a pair of shorts, and though her eyes couldn't quite focus underwater, she did see the shimmers of blue on his skin, running down his torso and the front of his shins.  
She popped up out of the water and cleared her eyes. Fenris was treading water with his head leaned back, looking up into the sky. He turned to face her.  
"You're a natural at his." He said as he bobbed, his mouth threatening to go under water as he spoke.  
"I am.. Not so much."He laughed a little. "It has been a while since I swam," he said, and this time he did seem to gulp a big mouthful.  
"It's shallower on that end over there," she said as she swam closer to him. She reached her hands through the water and they bumped up against a lean frame that was firm with muscle, but tantalizingly smooth to the touch.  
His hand found hers and she pulled him along with her, but he started to sink as he lost the ability to tread. Realizing that wasn't going to work, she unclasped his hand and moved in closer, gripping his body as gently as she could and she helped to ease him across the pool to the shallower end, kicking her legs as hard as she could to propel the extra weight. She had to suppress the urge to run her hands up and down the smooth surface that she was holding onto. But despite all the holding back she was doing, she couldn't deny that she still was very glad for the excuse to touch him. He watched her quietly, seeming almost amused.  
Too quickly she felt her feet touch the bottom and she anchored herself down in order to pull Fenris the rest of the way into the shallows.  
"You should be able to touch bottom here" she said, and he steadied.  
"I am sure I could have made it on my own." He said, his voice soft. "Not that I mind your assistance."  
"Of course. Sorry." Hawke felt a blush flood her cheeks and she took a deep breath and held it, letting the air in her lungs pull her to the surface so that she floated on her back. She closed her eyes against the bright sun, which shone red through her eyelids. She had a passing thought that her chest was out of the water and her shirt was wet, but decided she didn't care if Fenris got an eyeful of her. She wanted him to see her. She wanted to see him.  
"How does it feel?" she asked him, knowing he was close by, but she kept her eyes closed.  
"It feels… exquisite." He said, his voice almost a low groan. "How do you do that? Float like that?" he asked.  
"Take a deep breath and relax and you should start to float up naturally." She said. She listened, unseeing as he inhaled several times, hearing the disturbance in the water at his attempts.  
"It is not working." He said.  
She opened her eyes and let herself fall back into the cool depths, turning upright and moved herself close to him again, coming around to face him at his side.  
She placed a hand on his lower back, ordering herself not to let her hand roam the way it was dying to.  
"Take a deep breath, and hold it in." she said, and he obeyed.  
She put pressure on the small of his back, and helped his body rise.  
"Relax your body Fenris," she instructed and she felt his muscles let go in stages… releasing a little bit at a time until he was almost limp. His arms splayed out at their sides, moving with the motion of the water. One of his hands brushed up against her stomach and he made no attempt to move it. Slowly his body rose until it was almost horizontal with the surface of the water.  
"You can breathe, but breathe deeply, as the air in your lungs is what will help you stay floating." She said as she placed her second hand on a different part of his back to steady him. His hand slid along the skin of her stomach until it rest at her side. She felt goosebumps rise along her skin, crawling up her back and spreading over her neck and scalp. His hand twitched a little, and then moved in place against her, cupping her body with his palm just above her hip. Butterflies took flight in her stomach as she realized that the placement of his hand was no accident.  
His eyes were closed, dark lashes resting against his cheek and his lips were parted. She wanted so badly to kiss him on his perfect rosebud lips. She pictured herself leaning down and doing it, softly laying her own mouth on top of his. She wondered what his reaction would be.  
Should I? She asked herself, her heart starting to race.  
The feel of his smooth, firm back under hands was causing warmth to pool between her legs, almost pulsating with the beating of her heart. She let her eyes roam over his shirtless body, inspecting the markings that curled over his sinewy arms and shoulders, down the sides of his torso. They did spread down every limb, following the bones in his hands and feet, enhancing the curve of his thighs. She almost felt afraid to let her eyes fall upon his shorts, as she knew she would earnestly search for the bulge of manhood that was under there. A sharp thrill raced through her just thinking about it, just as it always did when she would lay in bed at night, imagining Fenris there with her, crooning deep tones in her ear and covering her body with his. She closed her eyes against the urge.  
She moved in a little closer still, so that her chest brushed against his side. She could see the faint circles of her nipples as they constricted against her wet shirt, and knew for sure now that if Fenris had wanted, he could have gotten quite a revealing look at her when she was the one floating on the water's surface.  
Her eyes went back up to his face. She had never been one to find elves inherently attractive. The wide bridges of their nose and unnaturally large eyes were so distinctly different from humans, that for most of her life they were just a little too alien to her. Lothering had seen very few elves during her time there, and the first time she saw one in real life as a girl she had stared rudely, fascinated by their dramatic facial features, as well as their long, gazelle-like necks and lanky limbs. Her mother had reprimanded her over it, telling her they were people just like any other. Even later in her life when she had gotten to know many, she never felt anything like a physical attraction to them.  
Until Fenris. But even that had not emerged until they began spending time together. Until the personality below his gruffness had begun to show itself during their long, late night talks over bottles of wine.  
And now here she stood, almost cradling his mostly naked body as he floated before her in a spectacularly beautiful pool on a spectacularly beautiful day. But even the beauty of their surroundings paled in comparison to the creature that was stretched before her. His silvery hair flowed out from his head, and his dark brows soft and relaxed. He could be sleeping, she realized. She let her left hand begin to slide slowly from the small of his back up toward his shoulders as she maneuvered her body closer to his head, while still supporting his lower half with her right hand.  
"How do you feel now?" she asked him as she brought her face close to his ear, her voice cracking. She saw the soft throb of the pulse at the base of his neck and heard slow breaths moving in and out of his open lips. She felt breathless herself, intoxicated with the closeness.  
"I…" he began, and then paused, sounding as though speaking was taking great effort, "I don't recall the last time I have known such comfort. And peace." He finished finally. His eyes flicked open briefly, and she was close enough to see the adjustment of his pupils as he focused on her. She was almost trembling with the effort it was taking to keep her lips from descending down onto his. After a second of gazing at her face, his lids closed again lazily. His one hand remained on her side and she moved into it, wanting it to do more than just lay there.  
"Hawke," he began.  
"Yes, Fenris,"  
"Thank you for everything you do for me. You are… a good friend." He said. "Bringing me here, allowing me this… I appreciate it."  
Her hand which now held him at the base of his neck felt the vibrations from his rumbling voice.  
"This is no hardship for me Fenris." She said, wanting to go on. She had never been so unsure of herself in her pursuit of a man before. She hadn't been with many, but usually when she knew what she wanted she did not hesitate to be direct. Fenris, however, seemed to require so much more finesse than she was used to. With his brutal history and the resulting mental anguish he suffered, she had been treading as lightly as she could. She wanted to earn her place in his heart, not try to force herself there. And she was close. She knew that by the secrets they shared. But it had been over a year since their overt flirtations began, and the progress was incredibly slow moving. He had openly called her beautiful, and was open about the flirtations. He made no secret of the fact that he enjoyed and desired her company. But what her company should consist of was less clear.  
"I also should thank you for your patience with me," he said as if reading her mind. His eyes opened again and locked onto hers and the grip of his hand on her side tightened. She was again consumed with the urge to kiss him. But a large part of her had always hoped that he might be the first one to kiss her.  
"It's my pleasure," She said and his lip curled in his little half smile.  
To her disappointment, Fenris righted himself in the water and her hands fell away from him. His fingertips trailed gently along her skin as they retreated and they were separate once again. She stood on shaky legs, feet sunk deep into the muck of the pool, and watched as Fenris submerged himself completely.  
Her heart was still racing and the point between her legs was still throbbing with desire, but there was nothing she could do about that, she realized.  
She dove under the water again herself and swam in circles around the perimeter of the pool, kicking under and pushing herself below the surface until her lungs ached for breath. At one point she felt her body bump into Fenris, and came up only long enough to apologize.  
After some time, she climbed out of the pool and sat herself on a level bank, letting the sun warm her skin and dry her smallclothes. Fenris was already having more success in the deeper end of the pool, and would stop treading water every now and again to hang motionless in place, until he began to go under and had to kick himself back up to the surface for air.  
When he joined her on the bank, he seemed almost like a different person. His whole body was looser, not coiled tightly looking like he was ready to attack as was his norm. He smiled easily as he pulled himself into place beside her, and laid down on his back just a foot away. Out of the water she could now get an even clearer view of his body. She noted several cruel scars that sliced through the hills and valleys of his torso. His arms were lean and his the cut of his muscles carved impressive crevices into his limbs. He almost looked bulkier without his armor than he did with it, his warrior's physique looking like it was sculpted out of marble, and then painted in a shimmery blue.  
He rolled his head over to look at her again and flashed a bright, unexpectedly toothy smile and Hawke felt herself warming from the inside out. Despite the torture of being so close to a man who wouldn't give himself to her, she felt true joy at knowing she could bring him this peaceful afternoon, devoid of the usual heaviness that wore visibly at him.  
"We must do this again sometime." He said, causing Hawke to smile even wider than she already had been, enough to make her cheeks ache a little.  
"I'd like that." She responded.  
"And Fenris, if you'd ever like to take a full bath, you are welcome to at my house. It takes about an hour for Bodahn to fill the tub, but he doesn't mind."  
"I don't like having people wait on me like that." He said as his head rolled back and his eyes closed.  
"I know. I don't either, but he insists that he prefers to have something to do. Maybe he can show you how he does it, so you can do it yourself if you ever choose." She said. "You know you are welcome in my home any time, whether I am there or not."  
"You are too kind." He responded. "Do you offer this to all of your friends?"  
"Not everyone. But I like having you there." She said.  
"Well, perhaps. I don't want to to take too much advantage of your hospitality."  
"Take advantage. Please. That house is too big for the few of us there. Most of the space goes to waste. I suppose I don't have to tell you what that's like."  
"I've yet to understand why you like having me around all the time. Most people eventually find me insufferable, and are glad when I inevitably decide to move on." He said.  
"Inevitably? Does that mean you might leave me too?"  
"I have no plans nor desire to do so. But eventually I will need to rid myself of the monkey on my back. Danarius might be laying low for now, but he always comes after me. And if he doesn't, I can't wait for him forever."  
"Let us go after him, then. End this once and for all." She said.  
"I wish it were that simple. But still, when the time comes, I will welcome your aid."  
"You can have whatever you wish from me." Hawke said as she sat up, her arms feeling tired from propping her up behind her.  
"You say things like that often." Fenris said softly. "You offer me everything of yours. Your home, your help, your time. I know all people are not so generous as you. You are… unlike any woman I have ever met."  
Hawke looked at Fenris and felt an ache in her gut. I would give you all that I have and more, she thought. For a moment it hurt to look at him, laying exposed in all his splendor.  
"I would do anything for you Fenris. You must know that by now. I have made no mystery of how I feel."  
"No, you haven't," He said.  
Fenris sat up for a moment and scooted closer, then lowered himself back down on the ground on his side, but to Hawke's surprise he laid his head in her lap.  
Hawke's breath caught in her throat as his damp hair tickled her skin, and one of his ears impressed upon her bare thigh. His body relaxed and she lay her hand softly in his hair and began to stroke the damp strands. She smoothed it behind his ear, sliding her fingers along the delicate point of his eartips. Something inside of her was exultant, rejoicing at this small closeness, this rare physical intimacy. One of his hands crept up and rested itself upon her knee, and he let out of a quiet, contented groan.  
"I would do anything for you as well." He said quietly.  
After some time of happily stroking his hair, she let her fingers wander around his neck, lightly caressing the unmarked skin. It caused goosebumps to rise on his arms, and she had to fight the urge to let her hands wander further. She was beginning to get uncomfortable in her position but had no desire to move until she was forced to. She felt the urge to giggle with giddiness as she looked down at the man she had been quietly in love with for so long, who was laying against her. This hard, closed up man who was abrasive to everyone else, evidently felt completely safe with her. And finally, she had the freedom, the invitation even, to touch him. She threaded her fingertips through his hair, massaging along the soft flesh of his scalp, trying to soothe and comfort him as deeply as she could. The words, I love you, had been on the tip of her tongue so many times, so she was practiced at swallowing them down, But in those moments she gazed down at him resting in her lap, it seemed harder than ever to do so. To keep the words from spilling out of her mouth unbidden, she bit down hard on her tongue. The last thing she wanted was to move too fast for him, to pressure him or force an awkward response that would just ruin the moment.  
When the sinking sun began to cast cool shadows around them, Fenris sat up and rubbed his eyes. He gave her another full, open smile and she found herself trying to mentally capture the image, saving it away for viewing in her private moments.  
"Let us return to Kirkwall before darkness falls." He said as he stood. He held a hand out to her to help her rise, and she clutched it eagerly, not actually needing the help, but grateful for it nonetheless.  
The sudden coolness of the air made her nipples contract, and she felt the points of them poking at her thin shirt. Fenris's eyes flicked down for just a brief moment, and then he turned his back to her as she began to dress.  
They both dressed and then descended the side of the hill. Fenris remained loose, which Hawke observed in his swinging arms and fluid movements as they strode down the hill. She smiled inwardly. In the three years that she had known each other, she had never seen him look so natural or carry himself with such unburdened ease.  
Their walk back to Kirkwall was mostly quiet, though Fenris cast the occasional smiling glance at her. He had told her once that their comfortable silences were one of the things he liked most about spending time with her. She was easy to talk to, he said, but also just easy to be with without needing to talk. He said that he could feel like he was alone when he was with her, and that was one of the highest compliments he could pay. "I feel no obligation to entertain you, or do anything differently than how I normally would when by myself. I have never known that in the company of another before. It is such a relief." He had said.  
Those words came back to her often. She understood what he meant. She recalled numerous friends and boyfriends who she would come to spend too much time with, and would eventually find herself just waiting for them to leave. So she could go back to normal, she felt. Do what she wanted, and no longer cater to them, even when she wasn't even sure what she was holding back or doing differently in the first place.  
"You must be hungry. Will you come eat? Mother always makes so much food, it's a shame to put it to waste." She asked when they entered Hightown.  
"Are you sure?" he asked.  
"Of course, Fenris. Unless you're sick of me, of course. Then you can always slink back to your mansion for a dinner of wine, followed by a dessert of wine. And maybe a nice wine nightcap." She joked. "You never have anything to eat there. It is a wonder how you haven't completely wasted away."  
"That is partly your doing. Maybe if you didn't feed me so often I would forced to get some food for myself." he said, "But alright." He snickered, "to your house it is."


	5. Chapter 5

On the third day of travel, there were breaks in the clouds and the line of mountain snow descended the peaks so that it was just a brisk walk away from where Hawke and Anders trotted their horses. It was the second time in her life that she had seen snow so close, the first being a freak winter storm during her childhood in Lothering. But at that time the fluffy white stuff that was so magical didn't stay fluffy or white. On its second day in Lothering it had turned brown and melted just enough to pack down into hard ice. And the third day it had melted away completely leaving the whole town a muddy mess.  
This snow was not brown, nor did it look hard, but the chill in the air was sharp enough to inhibit any desire to get off her horse and inspect it personally. Maybe on the way back, she thought.  
The mood that had kept Anders quiet the entire previous day was now gone, replaced with frequent smiles cast in her direction even when conversation was sparse. Hawke alternated between the thrill and excitement of a new love, and feelings of anxiety and panic as she was intermittently seized with fear regarding their return to Kirkwall. Will she want to keep things with her and Anders quiet for a little while so she could break the news to Fenris first? Or just dive right in, holding nothing back regardless of who they were with? Or might she want to take a little break from both of them for a while, to clear her head and figure out who she really wanted? She decided that since there was still a good week before they were back in Kirkwall, and in that time she had Anders all to herself without anyone else's opinions to worry about, she would just see where things stood at the end of their journey. The desire to move on from Fenris and focus on Anders remained strong, but all it took was one thought to those green eyes, or any of the unexpectedly sweet things he had said to her, and the panic about what she had gotten herself into would flare up within her again, faster than she could stamp it out.  
They stopped to eat more handfuls of dried fruits and nuts and he pulled her close, wrapping his arms around her and attempting to warm her with his body. When still they shivered, he kicked a cluster of sticks into a pile and streamed flames from his fingertips to start a quick fire. "Just for a few minutes," he said as he pulled her down into his lap, resting his chin on her shoulder.  
On this day they felt the urgency of their mission with a renewed vigor. Three days was a long time, and anything at all could have already happened in Hercinia. For all they knew the deserting Templar could already be long dead or gone. The documents could easily have been destroyed, or in a different location entirely. She felt almost jittery with the need to move as quickly as possible, and could see that Anders joined her in this. But she was not prepared for this cold. Normally going north meant warmer climates, but the Vimmark mountains seemed to be made of ice, and the closer to the mountain they traveled, the more frigid the air got. But despite their rush, a little rest and a quick fire to warm up was welcome, necessary even, to melt the slush out of her blood and ease the painful cold out of her limbs. They sat together with their hands held over the flames, heads resting together so they could trail gentle kisses along each other's lips and cheeks.  
Their one night together, as well as all the stolen moments of affection during the day, seemed to transform Anders, imbuing him with a vivid color and vitality. His eyes seemed brighter, and an almost delirious note was added to his laughter. The task at hand required that they stay on their horses, riding diligently toward their destination, but they regularly reached out to each other, quickly touching cold fingertips across the gap between their horses.  
"I have sort of got my heart set on a bed tonight," Anders said, his eyes glinting. "Not that I am not up for the challenge of trying to keep you warm all night in a tent."  
"Is that right?" she responded, "Well let's hope we find an Inn before the sun goes down."  
"If the progress I have been marking on the map is correct, we should run into a town in about two hours. We might not have any light then," he said looking up into the partly cloudy sky. "But we can't afford to stop any sooner."

For the last stretch of the day's journey they were pushing their horses too hard for conversation. The clomping of the hooves and jerking of their bodies made trying to understand each other's words too difficult to even bother. When finally the dim lights of the town came into view, Hawke was starting to get sore and was grateful to pull out the feedbag and bid goodnight to her mount.  
"How do you think the wards are holding up?" she asked as they approached the tavern door.  
"They're weakened, but still there. We should be cautious."

This town was considerably bigger than the first one they encountered, and the tavern was larger, louder and busier. No one looked up at all when they entered, and Hawke suspected that was just the way of things there, and not necessarily the wards' doing. While the air outside was frigid, inside was warm and raucous. Most of the patrons had obviously been there for a while, and the atmosphere was thick with laughter and the scents of sweat and savory foods.  
Anders kept his hand on the small of Hawke's back as they weaved around the other patrons to the bar. The bartender didn't raise an eyebrow at all to them as they ordered two plates of whatever was available from the kitchen, plus the usual portion of wine and a room. Anders pulled out his map and he and the bartender poured over it for several minutes, pointing out landmarks and confirming different routes.  
The room in this tavern was practically palatial in comparison to their first one. Among its appointments was a sofa, a full table set, a small fireplace and a cask of water. If Anders had insisted on sleeping on the floor here, he would have had plenty of space, though Hawke knew that wasn't going to happen now.  
"This is almost as big as my room back home," she remarked.  
"I paid a little extra," Anders said as he closed in on a kiss. She pressed her mouth to his and for a moment, completely against her will, she thought again of Fenris. It seemed the further away they got from the previous night's passions, the more her thoughts wandered back to Kirkwall.  
Hawke tried to shake off the weight of what waited for her in Kirkwall and pointed her focus back to the man before her. He was an extraordinarily good kisser, she realized. He alternated between soft and tender, tickling her lips for just the right amount of time, before diving in with more force and depth, his lips capturing and teasing hers. She recalled laying in bed their first morning and wondering about his kisses, but for whatever she had imagined, it still surprised her that he could pull such feelings and sensations from her with just the skilled movements of his lips.  
She groaned in response as she received his mouth, and his hands on her waist reacted immediately to the sounds coming from her, tightening and fingers digging into her. As sore as her body was all over, both from the horse and from the previous night, it did not stop the stirring she felt between her legs. But despite this, she also felt almost delirious with exhaustion. Between the lack of sleep the following night and the hard day's ride, she wanted nothing more than just to climb into bed and fall off into unconsciousness.

"Hmm…" she began to try to talk as she unlatched herself from him and turned toward the table. "Don't forget, we have hot food!" she said and they both went enthusiastically for the table. They ate in silence, passing the wine bottle back and forth until it was emptied. Not a word was spoken as they both hungrily emptied their bowls.  
"Mmmm, if I never have nuts or jerky again it'll be too soon." Said Anders as they leaned back in their chairs, satisfied with their full bellies.  
When they were done, Anders picked up Hawke's hand and led her toward the bed. She stopped him a few steps away and began to loosen his clothing. She slid off his coat, laying it on one of the chairs, and slowly worked at the buttons of his shirt. When it was off she ran her hands down his chest, taking in the soft warmth of his skin with her palms. She walked around him in a full circle and mapped out the geography of his lean body using her hands as a guide. She felt him shiver as she traced her fingertips around gentle slopes of his neck and shoulders, and before long he turned and began tugging at her clothing.  
She was reminded of the afternoon he first placed the wards on her, his hands moving up, around and over her body. They were gentle then, raising little goosebumps on her arms. And they were gentle now, but also thorough, searching and nimble. But in time they were replaced by his mouth, as he pushed her back and guided them toward another slow, open-eyed lovemaking session.

When they were finished, they looked at each other in the soft lantern light for a time, until Hawke felt her eyelids growing unbearably heavy. Hawke had never spent an excessive amount of time just laying about naked with the few lovers she had before, but she found that she loved Anders' reaction to her bare body. The way his brown eyes seemed to glow with an ecstatic focus, taking every inch of her in and radiating that hunger for her that made her feel swallowed up. His hands followed his eyes as though he had no choice in their movements, and he seemed to be praying over her, reveling at the altar of her physical form. She was happy to watch him, but it wasn't long before she was no longer able to fight the pull of sleep.

Anders had been correct in his four day estimation, and Hawke was surprised to see the edges of Hercinia appear when it was only midday. The final approach of their destination raised their spirits and they urged their mounts forward the final few miles, racing through the streets toward the docks. In many places they had to slow to accommodate traffic or narrow footpaths, but it didn't take long before the glinting of the water was visible between the wooden shacks. At the first hitching post they saw, they tied up their horses and walked briskly over toward the masts of the ships.  
There were only a few ships in the port that were large enough for a long oversea journey, so it was these that Anders approached first, looking for the vessel that had most likely carried his contact.  
"You the ones looking for Sylvan?" a small brown man called out over the bow of one large ship.  
"That's us." Anders replied.  
"Well you'll want to head over to the Wandering Sail. It's just a few blocks that way. Maybe you'll catch 'im before he heads to the brothel. After that, there be no fetchin 'im til morning."  
They waved their thanks and walked to the tavern. There was still several hours at least until the sun went down, but the tavern was as full and loud as the Hanged Man was during its peak nighttime hours. Most of the patrons had the dark, tanned skin of the hot lands further north, and Hawke quietly studied the strange clothing styles as she followed behind a searching Anders.  
They found him in the back end of the bar, with a busty barmaid perched on his lap. His hands appeared to be roaming around under her clothes, and he did not seem particularly happy when Anders approached.  
"Sylvan," Anders said as he nodded in greeting.  
"Give us half an hour love," he whispered into his barmaid's ear as he bucked her out of his lap, sending her off with a smack to the behind.  
Anders slid into the barstool beside Sylvan, and Hawke beside Anders. Sylvan had the brown leathery skin she was so accustomed to seeing on sailors, with grey hair and eyes so dark they looked black.  
"No Seekers sighted in two days now," Sylvan said quietly as he took a sip of his ale.  
"And the Templar?"  
Sylvan shook his head, pulled a sheet of paper out of his pocket and slid it alongside the bar toward them.  
"That's got all the information I 'ave. A few names. Location of the underground hideout. Tis not an exact location, and I can't come with you, so you'll have to do some lookin' fer it on your own. And talk yer own way in." He said.  
"When was the last time you saw the Templar?"  
"Only the once, right before I wrote ye. Aven't seen 'im since."  
Hawke tried to pay attention as Anders and Sylvan spoke, but they kept their voices low enough that it was a struggle to hear, and Anders had his back to her for much of the conversation. Her mind wandered around the tavern to the interesting characters that filled the tables, and, inevitably, back to Kirkwall.

The paper described a set of caves located in some hills about an hour's horse ride outside of town. Anders and Hawke ordered bowls of stew which they ate so quickly they barely tasted, and then raced out of town on their horses following the directions. They reached a hillside that was littered with clusters of boulders just as described and which supported a gnarled tree that twisted its bare branches high overhead.  
It took another hour to locate the cave. They split up, traipsing through hills and tall grasses, staying within view of each so that the other could be signaled as soon as anything was found. Finally her eye was caught by the waving arms of Anders, and she crossed the field to where he stood in front of a surprisingly small hole in the ground at the base of a low hill. It was only big enough to be crawled through.  
They looked at each other with a little shrug, and then Anders leaned in, lighting a fireball over his hand to illuminate the interior of the cave.  
"It goes back pretty deep." He said. Realizing he couldn't crawl one handed, he extinguished his flame and began his entrance into the dark. She felt an eerie chill pass over her spine as she squeezed through the tunnel behind him, feeling uneasy and claustrophobic. After a few meters the cave opened up into a larger room and they were able to stand.  
"I think I hear voices," Anders said, and they both froze in place, listening into the depths of the cave. Sure enough, there were the low echoes of someone speaking, and the sharp intonations sounded decidedly unhappy.  
He conjured another ball of flame, this one kept small enough so that it lit up only their immediate surroundings, and they crept gingerly through the rocky cave. Anders reached back and took her hand, nervously running his thumb back and forth over her knuckles. She felt his anxiety in his jerky movements and the energy around him, causing her to feel her own nervousness rise with his. When a faint glow appeared several meters away, he extinguished the flame again and they tiptoed toward the opening.

Hawke gasped at the scene before them. Torches flickered over the heads of three mages in tattered robes who knelt on the ground, their hands bound behind their backs. Their faces were bloodied and swollen and they were pleading with two large figures that paced back and forth before them. Those figures had an image of a large eye in front of a chantry star on their chest plates. The Seekers had found them.  
"You must know we can't leave anyone with this knowledge," One of them was saying, a man with dark hair and even darker eyes, set deep inside a pale and bony face. "Even if we wanted to, we have our orders. We regret the way this all turned out, but there's nothing we can do."  
Hawke clutched at Anders' arm, and they watched the figures before them breathlessly. She felt the pounding of Anders's heart under her grasp, and she realized in a panic that they had not brought any weapons. Stupid stupid stupid! But they were not expecting a fight, if anything they were only expecting some creative storytelling in order to gain the access to the documents. But still, they knew the Seekers had been to Hercinia and were searching for the same thing they were. How could they be so foolish as to enter the cave completely unprepared?  
The second Seeker turned to pulled out a small stack of papers from a book on a table behind them. Anders inhaled sharply once he registered what those papers were, and the Seeker moved toward one of the torches, holding them over the flames. "Unfortunately for the Circle, the secret dies here, along with all of you."

Breaking frantically from her grip, Anders rushed forward through the opening and into the torchlight. "NO!" he called angrily, pointing his palm out to send a blast of ice at the burning documents. But the papers were dry and already half consumed in flames by the time they iced over and fell to the floor, breaking into several clinking pieces at the impact.  
All the faces were pointed at Anders now, eyes wide and surprised, and the Seeker who had held the documents was clutching his frozen hand and squeezing back a scream. Hawke rushed up to join at Anders' side, but before she reached him he swung his arm forward again and blasted the closest Seeker in the face with a devastating stream of ice. The Seeker fell backward stiffly, the upper third of him frozen solid, while the other Seeker charged. The three mages on the floor scrambled up, and retreated deeper into the cave. Hawke squinted through the darkness at them, seeing that they seemed to be untying the binds on each other's hands. Good, she thought. She and Anders would need their help.  
"Wait! Come back!" Anders called to them as he unleashed a mind blast shockwave that threw the charging Seeker back, and taking Hawke back as well. She hit the wall of the cave behind her with great force and crumpled to the ground, dazed and disoriented. She heard the scrambling, scraping sounds of a struggle as she shook the stars out of her eyes, and tried to regain her equilibrium.  
Suddenly the room began to grow brighter with an ethereal blue light, and she saw that Anders was changing, cracks of blinding blueish white breaking loose from his eyes and skin. Hawke felt that buzzing sensation that she sensed under Anders' skin sometimes when she touched him, but now it was in the air around her, building into an electric cloud of vibrating energy that filled the cave.  
The blue illuminated face of the sprawled out Seeker gawked up as Justice approached and stood over him, and his mouth twisted into the word "abomination" as his eyes filled with horror. The body of Anders, who no longer seemed anything like Anders at all, towered over him, appearing larger, taller and utterly terrifying compared to the man she knew. Raising one leg, he brought a foot down onto the Seeker's face with a sickening crunch. The Seeker's body jerked and twitched, and Justice roared,  
"YOU WILL NEVER TOUCH ANOTHER MAGE!"  
The voice had multiple simultaneous tones to it, and it reverberated so powerfully through Hawke's eardrums that it doubled her over in pain. Justice looked down at the body for a moment and then his head swung up in the direction of the retreating mages.  
"WHY WOULD YOU NOT FIGHT? YOU HOLD INFORMATION THAT COULD CHANGE THE WORLD FOR ALL AND YOU WOULD TRADE IT FOR YOUR LIVES?" he screeched.  
As he approached deeper into the cave the light he emitted unveiled a new pile of bloody bodies. Possibly the bodies of the mages that had fought the Seekers long before she and Anders arrive, she realized. What was it Anders' had said once? That when angered, Justice ceased to be a force of actual justice and instead twisted into a force of Vengeance. It was clear to her that that was who she was seeing before her now, as he ominously pursued some of the very people Anders had intended to protect.  
Vengeance stalked toward the cowering mages, and they began shooting bolts of their own magic at him. Their mana must have been low based on the weakness of their spells. They had to have fought, she realized. They barely had any mana left! Couldn't he see? Vengeance's hands flared bright with magic and he fired it, locking the three mages into place with a wall of ice.

Hawke pulled herself to her feet and staggered toward them.  
"Anders!" she called at the top of her lungs. "Anders you must stop this! Get him under control!" she called, but her voice was swallowed up in the rush of magical energy.  
"Anders they did fight! Can't you see how weak they are!? They are not your enemy!" She was screaming her throat raw, but the glowing figure responded to none of it. "Vengeance!" she called finally, addressing the spirit. She lumbered her aching body the last few steps and grabbed his shoulder. Vengeance spun to face her with a startling, inhuman quickness, his empty glowing eyes locking onto her as a brilliantly blue hand reached toward her.

"Hawke," Fenris said as he entered the room behind her. "Your mother said I could find you here."  
Hawke stared at her dagger rack and didn't turn. The shiny points of light that winked off her collection of blades had held her in thrall, as her mind raced over the events of the last several days. So much had happened, and everything in the world seemed to have shifted into an unnatural new order.  
Fenris's quiet footsteps approached and he stopped just behind her.  
"Something is wrong?" He observed, more of a statement than a question.  
Hawke didn't move, her brain unable to command her body to respond, unable to do anything but try to navigate the racing thoughts that crashed over every logical voice in her head. She wished she had brought her blades into that cave. They had been so close, a small set hidden away in the pack on the back of her horse. What an idiot she had been not to keep them on her! If she'd just had the time to sneak away for a moment she could have retrieved them. But she didn't know what that would have accomplished. She never believed Anders would really hurt her, even as it was happening. But that wasn't Anders. Even if he was in there somewhere, he had no control. And she had felt the instinct to kill kick in too late, as she was already dangling in the air before him. Had she the means and the opportunity, as well as the ability to overpower that rock solid grip on her throat, she undoubtedly would have done her best to strike him down.  
But did Anders really deserve to die? Justice did, that was certain. If Anders had been at the helm the mages might still be alive, but the hard truth was that he was truly an abomination and capable of being wrenched completely outside of his own control. The Seekers had certainly sealed their own fates when they sought to cover up their nasty little secret, but those other mages… That was a tragedy beyond words. And where was Anders now, she wondered? Flagellating himself somewhere within the depths of Darktown? Sleeping again in that bed they had once shared, still trying to recover all that had been drained out of him?  
An anger burned low and slow in her, a smoldering coal of hot red fury. She had been stupid, foolish. She remembered so little of what happened once Justice, no, Vengeance, took over, but more flashes were emerging over time, especially as she slept, or tried to sleep, during those silent, tense nights during the journey home. She had lain shivering and alone on the opposite side of the tent from Anders, himself limp and as good as dead to the world, and her sleep was destroyed hourly with flashes of terrible scenes that were more than just images. They were vibrations on her skin, roars that filled her head, terror that struck like a knife to the heart. It happened enough during the nights that she would eventually give up the attempt, and rise to stand outside under the stars. They at least remained the same, twinkling comfortingly in the same shapes and configurations that they had her entire life.

Once she woke to look at his back as he slept, wondering if she should just stick a dagger into it right then and end his suffering, end the danger he had brought into the world. But she quickly lay back down, unable to do it. The nights they spent in each other's arms still came into her mind, but they existed in a separate life it seemed. A completely different world. How could she see anything other than that roaring nightmare of a blue face when she looked at him now? She knew a day would come when they would have to face what happened, but that day would not be on the journey home.  
And yet, some part of her wanted to comfort Anders then despite the trauma she had endured. He had been there too, a silent witness to all the horror. But she couldn't actually bring herself to try, as she herself was instilled with a fear of her own that was beyond comforting. He had killed her. And then he brought her back, almost killing himself in the process. Her own death aside, none of the rest of that would have happened if she hadn't been there with him in the first place. Would it? Would he still have gone? Would that whole thing have unfolded the same way if he was alone? Maybe he would have reached them at a different time if she weren't along to slow him down and distract him. Earlier, before the Seekers discovered the cave. Or later, when there was nothing else to be done.  
Mercifully, he didn't press her for anything afterward. Didn't try to speak, didn't even bother to apologize. He had drained himself so completely in bringing back her life that he had barely been able to do more than collapse onto his horse day after day, letting her lead the way home.

Vengeance had apparently crippled her first, throwing her to the ground so hard she felt and heard countless bones crunch. He then stalked over to the three mages, finishing them off in a symphony of horrifying sounds that she was glad not see. When they were done he turned to her again, his distorted face burning a piercing bright blue. His mouth opened, and he roared incomprehensible words that rattled painfully through her broken bones. The unnatural volume that came from the spirit shook the walls of the cave around them, shaking loose rocks and boulders that fell onto the dead bodies that littered the floor. The rocks landed with a sickening wet thud that made bile rise in her throat, saliva flooding her mouth in preparation for vomit. And then there was the icy cold tendrils curling around her throat, constricting, burning with a chill unlike anything she ever felt before. Until that moment in the cave she had encountered no foe she hadn't been able to defeat. But her time was up. She had been completely, utterly, terrifyingly helpless in his grasp. And if Anders hadn't come to and picked her up afterward, reaching deep into the limits of his healing ability, that would have been the end.  
But she was alive now. She was whole and home. What was left of the documents confirmed the possibility of a cure for Tranquility, and she knew that no matter how else things might have gone, the Seekers were never going to let those mages leave alive. And with no armor and no weapons, neither would she and Anders. Vengeance had killed her, but it was possible he also had to be unleashed if they were to have any chance. The thought was nauseating.

Upon her arrival back in Kirkwall she had come straight into the weapon room of her mansion without so much as changing her clothes. It was unclear how many hours had passed, but there at least she felt safer, surrounded by instruments of death and defense. Her gaunt reflection hovered like a ghost behind the metal blades' glinting lights as she lost herself in thought, trying to piece together the scattered memories.  
A cold hand touched her shoulder and she felt her breath constrict in her throat again, the way it had before she was pulled completely out of her body and drenched in a bottomless blackness. She responded instinctively with a burst of strength, striking in the direction of the touch with as powerful a blow as she could muster.  
Fenris staggered back, caught completely off guard, and lost his balance to fall onto the weapon-room floor. His own instinct to fight reared up and his markings ignited, drenching him in a rippling blue light. The blue light was so much like what poured out of Anders that her heart started to race in an automatic reaction, adrenaline shooting like ice water up her spine. She was ready to fight back this time.  
But it wasn't Anders. It wasn't Vengeance.  
"Fenris!" she said finally, breaking out of her daze. A flash of anger flared up in Fenris's face, which Hawke didn't blame him for, but it left as quickly as it came, replaced immediately by bewilderment. She rushed forward, dropping to his side.  
"I'm sorry…" she whispered as she took his arm with shaky hands, preparing to help him back up. But he didn't try to rise, just repositioned his legs and sat.  
"I'm sure I deserve that, though maybe not for the reason you had in mind." He said.  
She sank down onto the floor, and let her head and shoulders hang heavily. Her stomach burned like she had swallowed a flask of acid. She realized she knew now what things must be like for him. Memories restored and then lost, leaving behind only fear and disorientation. And questions. So many questions.  
What to tell him? She wondered. What could she say about what had happened that wouldn't have him storming immediately out of her house and over to Anders's clinic, ready to rip his heart out of his chest? The time they were officially lovers may only have lasted a few hours, but she had no doubt he would rage and glow with a vengeance of his own at the knowledge of what Anders had done. He would probably even be glad for the excuse to finally challenge the mage he detested to a serious fight. She must tell him something, but there was so much she was afraid for him to know. She had never kept a secret from Fenris before, and now she had a whole head full of them.  
"If you can't tell me what happened, just tell me if there is anything I can do to help." He said.  
She let the thoughts she was trying to gather into an explanation fall back into their tangled mess, and breathed a sigh of relief. Of course he would give her the time and space she needed. If anyone would, it was him. It was a comfort even to be near him again, just to hear his voice. Fenris might as well have been like the blades on her dagger rack; he would slice right through anyone who tried to hurt her. And indeed he had, on many occasions.

What would make her feel better? She still felt the readiness to fight still flooding her, heightening all her senses.

She stood up on trembling limbs and bounced on her toes, shaking out her arms and rolling her neck, loosening her tense muscles.  
"Spar with me," she said, feeling the adrenaline still rushing through her. It would feel good to let it out, to remind herself that she wasn't completely powerless, no matter what Vengeance had done to her.  
"That I can do." He said with a smirk as he stood in a quick motion and readied himself.

She grabbed the wooden practice pieces, tossing him his usual single long piece, while taking two shorter pieces for herself. She stretched her legs out, pulling her tight muscles until they were relaxed and warm and gave him a moment to do the same.

Then she tapped into that soaring adrenaline and flew at him, the practice dagger in her left hand turned so that it was up against the back of her forearm, serving as a deflector, and the one in her dominant hand held out ready to strike. She knocked the shielding dagger against his sword, and while holding it at bay she swiped at his chestplate with her right, but Fenris hopped back out of range. Unlike so many warriors who specialized in the two handed blade, Fenris never seemed encumbered and slow. He always remained as light as a cat on his feet no matter how heavy his weapon, and he matched the quickness of her own motions step for step. He surged forward and landed a pommel strike on her chest, stunning her for half a second, before she spun around to his side, delivering a solid elbow to his kidneys. Somehow he maneuvered around to knock his wooden blade into her shoulder and push her back. If that had been a real sword, she would have been stuck right through already. Killed again, she realized, and the fight would have been over before it really began. This fired her up and she focused her energy, trying to streamline every move so that each attack flowed from one to the other with no wasted motions, no loss of efficiency.

With every advance by one deftly deflected by the other, their attacks quickened, wooden pieces clacking together almost in a frenzy. She was trying with all her skill to get the better of him, but he countered her every move. Occasionally their eyes locked in a fierce stare, pupils wide and black with that peculiar combination of forward focus and peripheral awareness. Her heart pounded with the effort of her movements, as she banged out all her fear and rage against him, unleashing her anger. One blow for Justice, one blow for Vengeance, one blow for the darkness that stole her as she was locked against the cave wall, one blow for the guilt she felt over her nights with Anders, one blow for the dead mages whose bodies had been mashed to pieces by falling boulders. One blow for the night Fenris walked out. One blow for all the pointless nights she spent in the street looking hopelessly up at his window. She seethed, directing her anger now to Fenris. Would any of this had happened if he hadn't left? Would she have been so eager to leave town with Anders if she had Fenris here with her, in her home, in her bed? No, she wouldn't have gone anywhere without him if she had the choice. Or maybe he would have been there too. Maybe he could have stopped everything from going so wrong, somehow, could have stopped Vengeance. She felt tears sting her eyes as she funneled all her strength at him. Everything would have gone differently if he'd just loved her in return. She would never have gone to Anders' door, would never have accepted his invitation. She might have been helpless back in the cave, but she was not helpless now. She was a force that he was going to feel, that he was not going to run from this time. He was going to deal her with right now, whether he liked it or not.  
Fenris banged up against the far wall, cornered by her enraged advances on him. But even though he could go no further back, she couldn't stop throwing out blows. Suddenly he lit up a bright blue and his wooden sword clattered on the floor as his hands reached up to capture her by the arms, trying to stop her flailing attacks. He glared into her with an angry snarl, a primal reaction to being the target of such unrelenting violence. The blue glow of his markings fired up fast and hot, reaching that zenith of sizzling intensity that always indicated when he was about to plunge his hand into someone's chest, tearing out their still beating heart.  
"Do it!" she growled. "You've already ripped it out once, might as well finish the job."  
His snarl fell away and the bright markings dimmed as her words sunk in. She remained poised before him, breathing heavily, heart pounding. She was waiting… one heart beat, two heart beats, a dozen of them. Waiting for what? He wasn't going to do it, that she already knew. His eyes were pained, his lips parted as he panted, still trying to catch his breath.  
Against everything she was expecting, he softened and pulled her to him, wrapping his arms tenderly around her. She uncoiled her body and felt herself break, and every dammed up emotion that she had been holding onto since the night he left came pouring out. Her body shook with the force of her sobs, and they slid down the wall together until he cradled her in his lap. His armor was hard against her cheek, but she dug into it anyway, clutching at his body with the last drops of strength that remained after their fight. He stroked her hair quietly and she purged herself of all the fear and confusion and despair. She cried for the memory of her death, her helplessness, the cowering mages, for her night with Anders, how for a short time it seemed that things with Anders could be good, beautiful even, despite the fact that she still loved Fenris too. She brought her face up to his neck and pressed it into his sweaty skin, inhaling the scent of him the way she had that night that they made love.  
At some point hours later, she woke to find herself tucked tidily into her bed. Her shoes and clothes had been removed and a glass of water sat on the bedside table. Her hair was damp with sweat, and her body was sore from head to toe, arms screaming out in painful cramps with every movement. She turned on her side and clutched at her pillow, holding onto it tightly and pretending it was Fenris there with her, cradling her in his arms again.


	6. Chapter 6

It took six days of recovery back at Kirkwall before Hawke set out on foot to finally check on Anders. She didn't know what to say, or what to expect from him, and her heart thumped heavily in her throat with each step as she made her way across town. The flashes of those dreaded memories came less often during the day now, but the nightmares still hadn't stopped, and she didn't think they were going to until she faced him, and the events of that night.  
Varric had come by her house right after they returned to ask why Anders had closed up the clinic and wasn't coming to the door. She still had yet to work out a quick answer to everyone's questions about what happened, about why they were both so different upon their return. She deflected questions whenever possible, and when pressed, just told them that she didn't want to talk about it. No one would even begin to imagine the truth of the matter, and she had no plans to make it known. Not only did she not want their pity, but she felt the need to protect Anders. From the backlash of her friends and from his being labeled as exactly what everyone feared from mages.  
Her own opinion of mages had altered some, tipping more toward fear than it ever had in her life, and she had felt herself beginning to sympathize more with the need to control them. She had many one sided conversations with herself about how mages are just people, and like any other people they came with all variety of temperaments, weaknesses and proclivities. You couldn't just lump them all into one category. Such as dear Bethany, who was as gentle a soul as she had ever known. But, Hawke admitted, she too was capable of ripping the earth open when angered. Yes, yes, they could be dangerous. But then so could many perfectly non-magical people. It was just that when mages succumbed to their weaknesses, they could wreak an entirely different level of destruction upon everyone else.  
She struggled with her new outlook. She didn't like what it meant for Bethany and all the others like Bethany, who didn't ask for and never wanted to be born with magic. It was a Maker given gift, wasn't it? Why would they be given it if not to use it? Why make it so vulnerable to demons? Did the Maker want all that destruction in the world?  
Fenris would probably be pleased with her evolving opinions, but she hadn't spoken about it with him as it would require explaining what catalyzed it. She still wasn't ready to tell him everything. She didn't know if she ever would be. Pieces maybe, but not everything.

And here she was, standing yet again at Anders' heavy clinic door. But it was daytime now, and the doors were closed and locked up tight, depriving all of Low and Darktown's refugees of his services. She had a flash of banging hard on the door and feeling her wrist scream in pain. But this time there was no pain. And there was also no answer. But Hawke was not going to give up that easily. No one had seen or heard from Anders in days, and even if she found herself unable to discuss the events of that night, she at least needed to see how he was doing. He could be dead in there for all anyone knew. The thought made her shiver.  
There was no one nearby to observe her, so she slipped out a lockpick, and picked open his door.  
The clinic was dark and the air stagnant and stale. She crept quietly through the main room back toward his bedroom and even that door was shut and locked. She knocked lightly.  
"Anders?" she called into the slats of wood, "It's Hawke."  
She waited, listening for any indication of movement on the other side. There was nothing. But he must have been in there for that door to be locked.  
"Please talk to me." She called gently and waited a little longer.  
She returned to the main room of the clinic and located a lantern. It was the middle of the day, but the clinic was dim enough that it might as well have been night.  
"Anders, I'm coming in." She called as she put her lockpick to work again. The latch clicked open and she heard her heart in her ears as she peered inside the pitch black room. She stepped in with the lantern and saw a familiar lump under the blankets of his bed. Setting the lantern down on the table she sat on the soft straw mattress beside him, and laid her hand on what seemed to be his back, which rose under her hand in a deep, shaky breath.  
"Anders," she said again and she heard quiet sobs coming from under the blanket. While for the whole journey back and several days after she was convinced she would be happy never to see Anders again, the sound of his despair was like a knife in her heart. She couldn't help but put herself into his head. How frightening must it be for him to have his body completely overtaken by a dangerous spirit, using it to commit heinous deeds. What must it be like to wake from an unconscious, out of control state to find a friend or a lover dead by your own hands? She wondered if he was aware of what Justice, or Vengeance, did when he was pushed aside in his own body like that. She hoped he wasn't aware of it, of any of it. Maybe that was scarier in many ways, but it was also kinder. She had to live with the images of that night, and she hadn't even seen everything. If he had to both enable and then helplessly watch the brutal actions of his spirit passenger then that was a cruel fate indeed.  
Feeling her heart begin to ache for him, she crawled into bed beside him and rubbed her hand up and down the blanketed figure. She wasn't sure if it was arm or back or something else that was under his caresses; he was so cocooned in his bedding that all she saw of him were tufts of hair sticking over the top of the blanket.  
She laid there with him quietly for a while trying to provide whatever comfort she could.  
"Please. You know we need to talk Anders. I need to talk about it and so do you. We need to try to make peace with this somehow." she said.  
"No I don't," he mumbled. His voice sounded utterly wrecked.  
"Don't you? Do you plan on staying here forever?"  
"Yes."  
"Well you can't."  
"I can too. This is my house."  
"And what about your fellow mages? You would just leave them all locked up as prisoners to the Order? Or made tranquil? What about those tranquil who could be restored?"  
Anders didn't answer for a moment, but then pushed the blankets away from his face.  
"Just because it is possible doesn't mean we know how to do it." He said quietly, his voice rasping. "Who would believe us when we can't demonstrate it or provide any proof?" Hawke was glad to hear the familiar voice of her friend again, as damaged as it may have sounded. She had been frightened to come, but when Anders was just Anders he wasn't scary at all. "It is not something to bring to light until we have more information. It's too important."  
"Are you sure? You know rumors are pretty powerful. A word here and there, placed with people who would get it back to the mages in the circle could inspire all kinds of unrest."  
She heard the words coming out of her mouth, but she wasn't sure why she was saying them. She wasn't sure it would be a good thing for Kirkwall citizens to have the mages be any more on edge than they already were. She wasn't sure it was good for the mages themselves. But planting a rumor that couldn't be substantiated was far more benign than some of the things Anders had suggested in the past.  
He was quiet, considering her words. She was just trying to energize him, she guessed. To make him want to get out of bed. Give him his cause back so he could stop dwelling on that night.  
"Have you eaten lately?" she asked him gently. He shook his head no, and she pulled a strand of hair out of his face. "Do you have anything here, or shall I go out and fetch you something?"  
"No to both," he responded. She sighed  
She wrapped her arm around him and squeezed.  
"Look Anders, what happened that night is going to stay between us, okay? No one needs to know. I don't want them to."  
"But they should know. I'm a monster. An abomination," he said. "Everyone should know that, so they can protect themselves."  
"And you would confirm yourself to be everything everyone already fears about mages?"  
Anders was silent. She pushed her hand under the blanket and searched for his hand. She found it and grabbed, but he didn't clasp her hand back, just let his own lie limp.  
"Come on Anders, get out of bed," she urged, trying to keep her tone gentle. "Please, lets just go sit down and I'll make us some tea."  
She climbed out of bed and pulled at his hand, trying to right his body. He had lost a considerable amount of weight in the week since she had last seen him. Even in the dim light of the lantern she could see his clothes hanging off him. His face looked sunken in, the hollows of his eyes deeper and darker than she had ever seen them.  
"I am everything everyone fears about mages," he said. Hawke made no argument as she led him out of the room and toward the small table and chairs by his makeshift kitchen. She started a small fire inside the stove and sat across from Anders at the table. He stared into space and Hawke was flooded with a sea of conflicting memories. In one moment he saw his face looking at her with intense desire, she felt the tenderness of his kisses. The way he had entreated her to be his lover. And then again glowing with a murderous rage, towering over helpless innocents. She blinked the pictures away, but when her eyes opened and lay upon him again they all just came right back. But still, he had been her friend for three years and her lover for a few nights, and her heart ached to see him look so thin and frail. She reached a hand for his, but he pulled away from her. She let her hands fall in the middle of the table to rest there.  
When the water upon the stove was boiling, she steeped tea leaves into two mugs and set one before Anders. He stared down at it despondently.  
"When he takes over, are you aware of everything he does?" she asked finally.  
He nodded, the movement of his head so slight as to almost be imperceptible. "We are one now."  
Hawke felt a shiver travel up her spine.  
"I have nightmares now. Every night," she told him. "I haven't had anything close to a full night's sleep since it happened."  
Anders continued staring down, motionless. Hawke nudged the mug of tea in front of him, but he still didn't move.  
"Thank you for doing what you did. After. It obviously came at great cost," she whispered. Part of her was yelling that she shouldn't need to thank him for correcting the fact that he had murdered her, but she squashed out that voice. She was sure he was already telling himself the same thing.  
His head hung lower, his unwashed hair falling between his eyes and hers. She sipped her tea and just watched him, her stomach aching for him. He looked completely broken.  
A tear fell silently from his head into his lap. Hawke stood up and walked around the table, kneeling down at his side and taking his hands into hers. They were cold and bony, and completely unresponsive to her touch. He must not have eaten at all to have lost so much weight in just a week's time, she observed. She peered under his curtain of hair and saw that his eyes were closed, tears beaded up on his eyelashes.  
"Anders. Those nights we had were so wonderful," she whispered. "I'm so happy we had them, at least." She said, his eyes squeezed and a sob broke from his throat. She stood and pulled his head to her chest, cradling it and letting him cry in quiet spasms that shook his body. He leaned against her, body still limp even as it shook. She felt tears well up behind her own eyes, a sob rising in her throat. She caressed his hair and kissed his temple, clutching him to her. Hoping that at least her embrace might help to ease some of his suffering.  
But all too soon, he began to pull away.  
"Just go, please. I can't… I just can't.." He whispered.  
She stood there for a moment, tears falling freely from her own eyes now. The angry voice piped up in her head again, this time asking what right he had to be upset with her. If anyone should be pushing the other away… She shut the thought down angrily. This man needs compassion right now, she told herself.  
"Anders…"  
"Please. All I can see when I look at you is what I did. Your kindness is just making it worse." He whispered. "Please just leave me."  
She exhaled heavily, and turned on shaky legs to walk out of the clinic. Maybe he just needed more time, she thought. Maybe she could try again after several more days. But at the rate he was deteriorating he didn't have many days left. Not if he didn't start caring for himself.

She walked directly to the Hanged Man and sought out Varric, who was in his room bent over his desk. He looked up in surprise as she let herself in and walked over to an open chair, seating herself in rush. "Hey…" he had begun but she cut him off.  
"Please don't ask any questions, but Anders really needs help," she said. "He won't let me, but he might let you."  
"Sorry Hawke, but I do have to ask a few questions." Varric said, turning to face her completely. "Such as, exactly what kind of help?"  
"He is not eating. Just laying in bed. This whole time that no one has seen him, he has just been wasting away in his room. I don't know what he will tell you if you go to him, but whatever he does, please try to just keep it to yourself Varric."  
"Maker's balls, what kind of shit did you two step in out there?" he asked.  
"The worst possible kind," she answered. "But there is nothing to be done about it now. Please, just trust me."  
"I gotta tell you Hawke, you're killing me here."  
"I'm so sorry to put this on you Varric," she said, "but he is going to let himself die in there if something doesn't force him out of it. I just tried… But he… I am not the right person for this particular job at this moment,"  
"Alright. I mean, you're scaring me a little right now, but… sure kid. I'll see what I can do."

Hawke retreated back to her home in Hightown, but was greeted by a mostly empty house. Bodahn and Sandal were occupying themselves in their usual manner, but Mother must have been off on a date with the new gentleman she had mentioned to her several days before. Bodahn pointed Hawke toward a plate of food on the kitchen counter that mother had left, and she picked at a few pieces of it, taking distracted bites that stuck in her throat. Even if they made it past, her stomach was roiling too much to accept any food.  
She cast her eyes around the mansion, looking for something to do. She walked back to the weapon room, looking at the straw dummy that she practiced on, but had no interest in that. Her library was full of books that she knew she wouldn't have the focus to read.  
There was only one other place she could think of that might get her mind off the shell of a man who just refused her help, only one place that had any chance of putting her at ease.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 

Fenris was not in his usual room, but the fire was crackling, and there was a half empty bottle of wine set next to an open book on the table.  
Good, she thought, he continues to practice his reading. She'd been noticing significant improvements every time they sat down for a reading lesson, and always felt quietly pleased when he pulled a book out and asked her to help him with something.  
She set the plate of food she had brought along down on the table and peeked at the book he had chosen. It was the book she had given him about Shartan, opened to page 131. He was making such good progress. Not far from the book lay a deck of cards and a pair of dice. He must have had a guest recently.  
"Fenris?" she called out. From a distant room, she heard a thud. She walked back out to the foyer to listen for more sounds of movement that might indicate his location within the mansion. He hadn't shown much interest in exploring all the unused rooms before, though Hawke had tried to get him to. She thought it would be fun to scavenge through the remnants of some wealthy foreigner's belongings, but he had politely declined.  
Another thump caught her attention, and she walked in the direction of the sound. It took winding through two hallways and looking into countless rooms before she finally came upon him, sitting in a dusty bedroom with a pile of books and papers around him.  
She lowered herself to the floor at his side and began to inspect the yellowed papers.  
"I can read some of this. These are correspondences, yes? " He asked.  
"Yes, letters to some guy named Hammond." She said as she inspected the faded scrawlings."Could that be the Tevinter merchant that originally owned this place?"  
"Perhaps. " He answered. He had an open bottle of wine beside him, and a glassy look in his eyes. She recalled the open bottle that was also sitting on the table in his room and wondered how much it was he had had to drink already.  
"Hm. Well some of these are a bit difficult to read. But they are dated. We could put them in order… Might be interesting if there's a story in there somewhere." She said. He nodded and began to pull all the scattered papers into a pile.  
"So, finally decided to explore the house then?" she asked.  
"Yes, Isabela came by to visit and have a few drinks, and ask if there might be an extra trunk laying around in one of these rooms that she could use. There are still so many personal items about, but many of the room still stink of death." He scowled. "Even so, there have been a few interesting finds."  
Hawke tried not to let her face register her dislike at the news that Isabela was there. Isabela had been throwing herself at Fenris for months. Then again, she threw herself at almost any attractive man, but seemed to have taken a special liking to Fenris. There was nothing she could say or do about it, as with so much that concerned Fenris, so she pushed the feelings down. The way he was talking though, she could tell it had been more than just a few drinks. He was drunk.  
She picked up the bottle, figuring she might as well join him. Her stomach revolted at the thought, but a night of intoxication sounded like a very pleasant alternative to worrying about Anders and replaying scenes from her waking nightmare. A smudge of lipstick on the bottle caught her eye and she felt her face sour.  
"You don't like Isabela." He said, more of a statement than a question.  
"I have said nothing about Isabela."  
"You don't need to. Your face does all your talking for you." He said, and she sighed.  
"Well that wasn't the case in our game of Diamondback the other night." She answered. "I was completely bluffing for half those hands that I won"  
Fenris laughed, an easy low rumble.  
"Yes well, card games aside, I can read you like a book. Actually, I can read you even better than I can read a book." He said as he laughed again. She always enjoyed drunk Fenris. He was more easygoing, and freer with his laughter. He even tried to make jokes.  
"Okay then Fenris, what am I thinking right now?" she asked him, gulping down some more wine from the bottle. She sighed and found herself fervently hoping he couldn't actually see what was in her head. The weight of the last week still crushed her from time to time and she wanted nothing more than to cast it off, even for a little while.  
"You are thinking…. Thank the Gods for the wine cellar." He said, holding his hand out for the bottle. "Well, that is what I am thinking." He said as he took the last few drops.  
"Actually… that's not far off," she said, impressed.  
"Have you been down there? It's glorious. Come." He said as he stood and offered his hand. She grabbed it and stood, and he didn't let go. She let herself be led through the hallway and down a set of stairs, trying not to hold too tightly to his hand. She didn't want to seem overeager.  
The room he led her to was spacious, and the racks that lined the walls from end to end were still half full with dark bottles.  
Fenris walked along one wall, pulling out bottles here and there. A few he slid back, and two others he pulled out and clutched under his arm.  
"Danarius always made us get the wine for him even though we couldn't read the labels. I had to learn to recognize different bottle types so I knew what to serve." Fenris said, "I had no way to know what all the symbols on the labels meant, I only knew I would be punished if I brought the wrong one. He seemed to enjoy that. Until I stopped bringing him the wrong bottles." He paused to appraise the one that was in his hand. "This one looks Antivan. We will open this one first."  
"How can you tell that it is Antivan?" She asked him as she eyed the perfectly ordinary looking bottle.  
"The color of the glass, specifically how the green has a bit of a blue tint in it. And look at how round the lip is. That means it's older." Hawke moved closer to him to get a better look. He had removed his gloves and the spiky shoulder pieces of his armor, but his chestplate remained. It made his profile look a little smaller, and the markings on his arms were more visible. "The older bottles are a little bulkier, more crudely made. And feel this, the bottom is perfectly flat," he said as he tilted the bottom toward her, and she ran her hand along the even glass surface. "This one is not quite vintage, but older than many others."  
He turned and ran his eyes along the racks, and then pulled out another bottle and inspected it. "See this one has more of a yellowish green to the glass, and a flatter lip at the top," he said holding it in front of the lantern so she could see the color through the empty section of the neck. "This is probably a common Free Marcher red. Nothing special." Comparing the one bottle to the other she saw exactly all the things that he was describing. When he flipped the second bottle over she saw initials etched into the glass, and also that the bottom of this bottle bowed gently up into itself.  
"These markings also help, though they don't all have them," he said as he fingered the etchings. "But now I know what many of the letters are." Fenris said with a subtle, satisfied smirk. "Except for this one. What it is this?" he asked, turning his face to shine his large eyes at her. She was blinded by them for a moment, and when she swallowed she realized how dry her throat had gotten. Time spent in close proximity with him continued to do that, no matter how long they were together.  
"That is a J. For Jack, or jab. Or Justi…."  
She stopped, finding sudden difficulty in finishing the name. "Justice?" Fenris finished. One of his eyebrows twitched, a flash of a silent question. Of course he had noticed.  
Hawke turned her focus back to the wine, blinking back the memories invoked by the word.  
"But I do know the letter J. This one looks… different." he said.  
"Yes, this one was given a bit of flair by whoever etched it." She said."That is common in different handwriting styles."  
"If people can just write letters however they want, how does anyone know what they are?"  
"It's not so difficult. It gets easier with practice, like most things," she explained. He eyed her as though he didn't believe her. "You'll probably pick it up as quickly as you do everything else."  
For a brief moment, Hawke thought she saw his cheeks flush.  
"Did you get to drink any of the wine you served?"  
Fenris laughed again, and she smiled at the sound.  
"You really know nothing of slavery," he said, "But actually yes. Only when Danarius wanted me to be…" he stopped, the sentence caught in his throat. She waited quietly for him to find the word he needed.  
"Loose." He finished.  
"Loose?"  
"Apparently certain activities are less enjoyable when the object of your… amusement is overly tense."  
Hawke felt her stomach heave, and took great pains not to let her reaction show. She recalled conversations over the years of her life where she had heard mention of how routine it was for a Tevinter master to bring his slaves into his bed. They were just property after all and that was considered another of their duties. Danarius's pet, is what Fenris had told her he was. She should have guessed that meant in every possible way.  
"I have tried to block that out. But I have been wondering if maybe that is why some memories were triggered when we…" he stopped and sighed. "But that was so different. I don't know.''  
Hawke felt her heart turn to the weight of lead, pulling down into her gut and aching with a force that reverberated through her bones.  
"Do you think differently of me now?" he asked worriedly.  
She thought hard about it for a brief moment, and realized that deep down, she had probably suspected. But the thought of her Fenris being used in that way struck too much anguish into her heart for her to really consider. She could never bring herself to acknowledge the question of whether it could be true. But she thought she could understand a little bit now about his hesitance, why it had taken so long for them to finally fall into bed together. So many men would jump into bed at the first opportunity, but Fenris seemed completely closed off to such behavior. His body was his own now, for the first time that he could remember. He probably needed to hold onto that.  
"Why should I think differently of you? You are still the same man you were ten minutes ago," she answered. She couldn't help but wonder if he would think differently of her if he knew about her and Anders. Not that that compared at all to being someone's slave.  
He gave her a sad smile and raised his hand to her cheek, briefly cupping it in an unexpected moment of tenderness. His touch was light and sweet against her skin but it was gone again in almost an instant. She felt consumed with an uneasy combination of despair and anger, wincing at the images of Fenris' suffering that came unbidden into her mind. If she had known where Danarius was at that moment, she would have broken down every door between them and made him pay for his depravity in the most creative ways she could imagine. And she would make it slow.

"So. What is your favorite kind of wine?" Fenris asked as he turned back to the racks. Hawke took a second to try to clear her mind of all the new and disturbing information. She tried to shake out the desire to murder Danarius that was now making her heart race.  
"Um, red?" she answered, and he laughed again, lightening the mood. "Sorry, I guess wine varieties are another thing that I know nothing about."  
"Then you probably have not had the pleasure of a very good vintage." He said, turning to cross the room. "You would know if you had," he said over his shoulder as he went straight for a bottle that was located in the lower corner of the furthest rack, and brought it to her.  
"Here, this one is yours tonight. Pace yourself. It is very strong," he said.  
"Massaad Finale" she read off the label. "This is Ferelden!"  
He curled his lip in a little smile and picked up a few more bottles before leading her out of the room.  
They made their way back through the labyrinthine halls of the mansion and across the foyer. The fire was lower now, most of the wood reduced to glowing coals, and the sky through his window was the orange and purple of sunset.  
"Mmm, yes. This is a good one too." He said as he took a swig from the open bottle that sat on the table. It wasn't often that Fenris hit the wine so hard, she thought. Either this was because Isabela had gotten him started on it, maybe with some smooth ulterior motive, or there was something he was trying not to think about. At least that's what was usually the case on the nights that he was drunk before the sun even went down. Maybe they were one in the same.  
He had a lot to try not to think about though, she realized as her mind went back to the revelation he had just dropped on her.  
She was a little embarrassed by her jealousy of Isabela. The feisty pirate had a charm and charisma that most people found completely irresistible, and she could lure most men, and women, into her bed with just the lifting of an eyebrow. Knowing that Fenris was not an easy catch helped a little, but Isabela had made no secret of desiring him even when Hawke was right there to hear every obscene comment.  
"You should eat. I brought you dinner." She said as she nudged the plate of food she had brought over toward him.  
"Mmmm," he groaned as he sat before the plate and pulled the towel off. It was just chicken with boiled potatoes and bread, but he ate it like it was a King's feast.  
"Please give your mother my thanks." He said between bites. "Again."  
Hawke took it upon herself to finish the other bottle of wine. By the time it was empty, she felt drunk herself. She was glad for that. After everything that had happened, including the emotional whirlwind of the past few hours, Hawke was ready to plunge herself into oblivion. She was sure that was an absolutely terrible idea, now that she had so many secrets to try to keep. And she still required the regular damping down of all the nightmares and memories, not to mention the urges and desires that never ceased to be aroused by Fenris. But she didn't care. If Fenris was getting drunk tonight, then she was too, consequences be damned.  
Fenris stopped eating to look at her. "What?" he asked.  
"What?" she responded.  
"Why are you looking at me like that?" he asked. She realized she had been staring at him.  
"Aren't you supposed to know? Apparently I am so easy to read."  
He snorted and returned to his food, taking the last two bites and then swigging his wine. His eyes turned back to her with a knowing shine.  
"You do not have to worry about Isabela." He said.  
"What?" she responded, surprised again by his perceptiveness.  
"Do I have to worry about Anders?" he asked, ignoring her question.  
"You would worry?"  
"Of course. Do you really think me so heartless?"  
"But we are not…" Hawke stopped, still barely able to say it. We are not lovers. Or we are not supposed to be.  
Fenris sat forward and despite the glaze over his eyes they still succeeded at boring into her, "You two obviously went through something. You won't share the nature of it and I won't push you to," he said. "But yes. I worry."  
She thought back to Anders' clinic a couple hours earlier. Whatever it was that was between her and Anders, the bliss that flared so hot and bright for so short a time, seemed to be done.  
"No. You do not have to worry about Anders," she said.  
"Good," he said softly.


	7. Chapter 7

The Massaad Finale started out sweet, and then melted into a smooth buttery nut flavor with a hint of smoke. Hawke closed her eyes as the evolving flavors flowed over her tongue and were swallowed down into her increasingly warm body. She opened her eyes again to see Fenris watching her with an amused smirk.

"Maker's breath!" she breathed. "You were right about this wine."

Her whole body felt light, but her thoughts had become sluggish, her mind's capacity for processing information shrinking and shrinking until it had closed out all that wasn't of immediate concern. It was exactly what she had been hoping for, and she had spent the last hour reveling in it.

Fenris was sprawled out over the little antique couch in the corner of the room and Hawke couldn't help but take a moment to admire him. His slender, lanky limbs stretched out lazily like a cat's, looking like the embodiment of grace itself. He was flipping through the pages of the yellowed letters from the other bedroom, only occasionally flicking his eyes toward Hawke, who was pulling clothes out of the giant armoire in the corner of the room. The suits and dresses she pulled out were so heavily adorned with sequins and embellishments that they were practically costumes. Maybe they were, she imagined as she inspected some of the more garish numbers. She stopped every few items to have more of the exquisite wine that Fenris had given her, realizing he had been correct about its strength. But it just tasted so heavenly she wanted more just to savor the swirl of complex flavors. She had never had anything like it, and the bottle was already half gone.

She pulled out a pale blue ball gown that had a full skirt and a low cut top. It looked to be about her size, and in a fit of impulse, she began unbuckling the last few pieces of her leathers that were still on, letting them drop heavily to the floor before throwing the dress over her head. It slid down over her and then stopped halfway down as it got snug. She pulled on the dress, trying to fit the tightest portions over her breasts and hips, and then heard a distinct tearing sound.

"Oops," she said, freezing into place at the sound of the tear. She stood there a moment with the dress stuck, half of it still draped over her head, and she heard Fenris's quiet laughter from across the room. She resumed her tugging and working the upper half of the dress down her body inch by inch when she heard light footsteps padding forward, and more gentle jerks of the fabric joined her own attempts. Eventually it was squeezed all the way down, but she had to turn and make some bodily adjustments, as all her curves were smashed under the unyielding pieces. Looking around the room, she realized there was no mirror.

"Well?" she turned to ask Fenris. She was beginning to feel a little woozy, and swayed on her feet a little bit as she was turning. Two hands gripped her waist and steadied her. She felt her heart jump at the contact and looked up into Fenris's face. His platinum hair was a little tousled from lounging on the couch, and she still startled a little at the unusual sight of his bare arms. On normal nights that he lounged around his house he would retain most of his armor, taking off only his gloves if he was feeling comfortable. Well, it only took him three years to begin to relax a little, she thought wryly.

He hovered close to her but his grip loosened. She could almost smell him as she stood at perfect eye level to the velvety skin of his long neck, and she felt the building desire to move in and brush her lips against it. The markings that had been given to him were obviously done by an artist with an appreciation for the elven body, as they followed and flattered so many of his natural curves. As cruel an enhancement as they were, they were quite beautiful.

"You do not look like yourself," he said as he stepped away from her to look her up and down. His pupils were dilated widely, making his eyes look darker and more glazed than ever.

"That," she sighed as she stepped away from him, "is precisely the point." She bent over to pick up the bottle of Finale and heard another tear, causing more laughter to bubble up almost deliriously. Fenris stayed locked in place, the only reaction visible being his little half smile.

"Don't you ever want to get completely out of your armor?" she asked him, wondering which of the flamboyant ensembles she might be able to talk him into putting on.

"It has been known to happen," he answered, "but not to play dress up."

"Well you're no fun Mr. Pricklypants." She joked. She didn't look like herself, and she also was starting not to feel like herself. And it was a tremendous relief.

She curtsied dramatically at him, feeling highly amused and heard another small rip.

"I'd better find a mirror before this thing bursts off me," she said as she turned and whisked herself out the door. She padded down the hall, opening doors to dark rooms, some of which did smell very strongly of old blood and death. Those doors she closed as quickly, but the others she kept thrown open. She found her way into a bedroom that was much larger than the one she and Fenris had been lounging in, with a lavish four poster bed, a wide fireplace, full vanity table with a mirror and more antique furniture. But the room was too dark for her to see her reflection, so she turned and made her way back to the other room to grab a lantern, passing a following Fenris in the hall.

She looked… ridiculous. She was bulging over the bust of the dress, which was slightly off center, and after the jaunt down the hall she was beginning to feel the strain on her breathing from the constricting bodice. Light blue was not her color, she realized, as it made her skin look ashen. Stick to your usual red, she told herself. The big puffy skirt made her look like something out of a child's storybook, and not in a good way. She had never worn a ball gown before, and if this is what it was like then she wasn't sad to be missing out.

"Okay, you're right. This is silly." She said as she frowned at her reflection. She thought she might at least look a little pretty, but the image that greeted her in the mirror showed a tired, bleary eyed girl who looked completely out of place in an unflattering and ill-fitting gown. Fenris was quiet, walking around the room and running his fingers over the ornate carvings in the wood furniture.

She picked the skirt up and threw it over her head, beginning the anticipated struggle to remove the whole thing. Her attempt to pull it over her head failed spectacularly, as the musty skirts only fell back down around her despite all her prodding. She heard more stitches popping as she squirmed and pulled, trying to unstick the bodice from her torso, but it had settled into all her nooks, and did not seem willing to be pulled back out of them. She walked over to Fenris, feeling defeated by the stupid dress and turned her back to him.

"Just rip the damn thing off." She told him. Her head was starting to spin with the massive amounts of wine she had consumed, and the effort spent wrestling the dress had made her realize how tired she was.

"Are you sure?" he asked, and she nodded.

His fingers pried under the fabric at her back and pulled as much of it into a grip as he could, pausing for a moment.

"Brace yourself," he said, his voice sounding torturously close to her ear.

Her body rocked with a powerful jerk as the dress shrieked a satisfying ripping sound. She took a deep breath as her ribcage was finally free of constriction, and pushed the offending dress down her body, kicking it across the room.

"Well that didn't go as you'd hoped," Fenris observed.

She shrugged, now realizing that she was standing there relatively exposed, in only her small clothes. Oh well, she thought. She had nothing Fenris hadn't already seen. And felt. And tasted. Once upon a time.

"Things rarely do," she sighed sadly. With the biggest, most painful example of that standing right behind her.

She turned around where Fenris still stood, close and quiet. She still felt thoroughly intoxicated, but the lightness of the wine was evaporating off of her and the familiar heaviness of her life was descending again, reminding her that everything wasn't as fine as she was pretending it was. It was complicated and scary, full of monsters and demons, as well as debilitating regret and longing for things she could not have. The fiery ache that burned in her chest most of the time was returning again, taking its place in its usual location just under heart.

And before her was Fenris; the excruciatingly beautiful object of her love and so many of her unfulfilled desires, as well as the bestower of confusion and conflicting messages.

She was still feeling a little bold, riding the wave of the wine, and without looking up into his eyes, she picked up his hand and brought it to her face. She brushed the long fingers against her cheek, nuzzling gently against them and pretending for a moment that they were caressing her on their own. He exhaled a shaky breath and she felt the warm air sweep over her neck. She moved his hand over to her lips, and she kissed the backs of his fingers, closing her eyes and inhaling the air around his skin. She took another second to savor the sensation, and then she let go of his hand. But it didn't drop the way she expected it to. It lingered in the air near her face, fingers twitching toward her but not making contact. And then, finally, it fell back down to his side.

"Hawke…" he began, "I.."

"I know," she interrupted. "You can't. You're sorry. You don't want to have to worry about Anders, but you still can't be with me." She kept her face turned to the floor, looking down at their bare feet.

"You're right. That was selfish of me," he whispered.

She shook her head slightly.

"It's okay, I understand," she said. "I really do. I'm sorry too." Finally she dragged her eyes back up to his face and into the deeply anguished eyes looking back at her. She felt her heart break all over again, the pain once only in her chest now flaring out to consume her gut and seep into her bones.

"I need to lay down. I'll take this bed," she said as she turned to walk away from him. She had to get out of proximity to his body, as standing so close to him was making her feel like she couldn't breathe. Already she missed the lighthearted camaraderie they had just reclaimed after weeks and weeks of not speaking, after the disastrous trip that she hoped would help her heal, but which had actually completely destroyed her. Her and Anders. But any pretense that things were easy and okay could only have been just that, pretense.

She collapsed onto the bed, keeping her back turned to Fenris, and slid under the covers. She curled herself around the ache that throbbed in her body, the ache which was born of emotions in turmoil but which manifested as physically as a punch to the gut.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx 

Hawke awoke with a start at the usual dream of the glowing blue face with the vacant eyes of light. She sat up, sweat drenched and heart racing, and blinked her eyes at the dark, clearing her mind of the familiar nightmare and searching her memory for where she was. Her head throbbed and still spun with the remnants of drunkenness. She must have only slept for a very short time, she figured, since the wine was still doing its work within her body. As tired as she was, she felt a restlessness that had her kicking off the covers and climbing out of bed to stand in the middle of the room. A box of silver moonlight glowed upon the carpet, taking the distorted shape of the bedroom window and casting a pale, dreamy light over the entire room. She heard the light sounds of deep breathing, and moved toward a slumped over figure in a nearby chair. Fenris. He had his own bed, he had a whole house full of beds, but instead of taking them he dozed here, limbs pulled into his body and head listing off to the side of the chair's wood frame. His neck would hurt when he awoke, she observed.

She took several quiet steps toward him, and then knelt down close enough to see the details of his sleeping face in the pale moonlight. Maybe it was time for her to stop torturing herself so much, she thought. Maybe she should resume a bit of distance again, so she could actually think without the crushing weight of her feelings for him clouding up her thoughts all the time. There was no question that she loved him, more deeply than she had ever loved anything in her life, and she would continue to be there for him when he needed her, but she needed to start protecting her own heart better. She was tired of feeling so vulnerable.

His hand dangled over the arm of the chair, and she brought her face to it, picking it up and laying her cheek against it the way she had only a hour or two before. His skin was warm, and she thought back to their one night together, two months ago now. For those blissful few hours in bed with him, she had had everything in the world that she wanted. And the pain of that memory was matched only by the pain of her own death. They could practically be one in the same.

"I love you," she whispered. Words she had bitten back countless times, but now could say only because he was lost in sleep. She pushed her face into his limp hand and kissed his palm. And then stood to leave.

Her leather armor was scattered about the house, left laying where the uncomfortable pieces had been discarded throughout the night. She found herself walking back and forth for an irritating amount of time looking for it all, and when finally she was fully dressed again, she slung her blades across her back and silently slipped out the front door.

The moon hung round and full directly overhead, and it illuminated the streets as well as any lantern. She walked mindlessly toward her own house, but once she got there she found herself continuing along, straight past her door. She wondered if Varric had visited Anders, and if he'd had more success with getting him to eat, or talk. She winced at the memory of Anders sitting despondently at the table, looking so thin and haunted. He had been completely unresponsive to all her touches, but she wondered what he would do if she walked to his clinic and climbed into bed with him again. Not to talk, but maybe just to be there while he slept, and hopefully help him to feel less alone. Or would that only make him angry? He'd been clear that he wanted her to go, but she had a difficult time reconciling the feelings he had expressed to her on the way to Hercinia with his request that she leave him alone.

But it would be so selfish of her to just disregard his wishes like that, she told herself.

She could go to The Hanged Man, and ask Varric. But she had no idea how late it was, and if Varric was sleeping then that would be pointless. Still, now that she was up and moving, breathing in the cool night air, she found that her feet just kept propelling her forward, well past her own house and to a destination unknown.

She walked the length of Hightown, stopping here and there to look up into the stars and admire the bright silver moon. But once she moved into the wide courtyard above the stairs to Lowtown, she heard a muffled sound that stopped her in her tracks. She retreated quietly toward a nearby building, cloaking herself in shadow, but knew she had already been spotted. The other shadows of the courtyard were pulsating with movement, and she pulled her daggers and squinted through the darkness to try to assess how many opponents she should prepare to face. She heard a sharp thwack as an arrow embedded itself into the stone just at her side, and she turned her head toward some movement off to the right just in time to see a metal blade surge toward her. She put up her daggers to deflect the blow and parry back.

"Well, well. If it isn't the biggest pain in the arse in Kirkwall. And all alone?" said a voice from behind the blade. "Must be my lucky night." The voice came from a carta thug, a smug smile shining through his bushy beard.

She sighed heavily. She had seen this guy before and knew he was merciless.

"Well, there's no point in chatting is there?" she asked as he jumped forward toward her. She dropped a handful of caltrops behind her for the bodies she heard sneaking up at her rear, while delivering a blow to his chest to knock him off balance, and sweeping a leg behind him to knock him on his back. She pinned him to the ground with a foot to the throat, and turned again just in time to spike a dagger into the throat of a second approaching body. And then back to the man struggling on the ground, bringing her foot up and back down in a heavy kick to the ribs.

"Do we really need to do this? I'm just trying to take a walk," she asked him exasperatedly. But he rolled out from under her and she had to turn again to counter another oncoming attack. The opponents came fast and furious, and she was spinning to deflect and deliver different blows in all directions, feeling the wine still in her system both helping her to remain loose but also making her unsteady and dizzy. She found herself on the ground more often than she would in a usual fight, but this time she did not have her usual team of backup to give her time to recover. Each time she scrambled back to her feet after receiving a stunning blow she felt more and more weary. The bodies just kept coming at her. She took a deep breath and steeled herself against another attack against a particularly aggressive opponent, and she lost herself in a flurry of movements. Thankfully any remaining attackers were keeping their distance at that moment, as her energy was flagging and she was sure he would get the better of her if she had to divide her attention to other opponents. She heard their footsteps around her, but no one was approaching for whatever reason. Not one to argue with luck, she focused on the brute and, finally, after delivering blow after blow he went down, and stayed there.

She stood up to look around at the littering of bodies around her. There were at least a dozen. But what happened to the others that she had heard? A movement of white out of the corner of her eye caught her attention, and she took a deep breath as she turned, trying to conjure up the strength to attack again.

"Fenris? "she asked as he walked toward her with an eyebrow cocked.

"Hawke."

"You've been behind me this whole time?" She relaxed her stance and sheathed her daggers.

"I only meant to make sure you got home safely, but apparently home is not your destination," he remarked as he looked pointedly toward the entrance to Lowtown. "Or are you just trying to get yourself killed?"

"I was doing okay there for a while."

"Yes, but you are tired and still full of wine. And it showed."

He was right and she knew it.

"This… excursion of yours couldn't wait until daylight?" he asked. His tone was sharp and reprimanding.

She didn't know what to say. She wasn't even entirely sure where she was going. The thought kept crossing her mind to check on Anders, and that she could probably even get in and out without him knowing she was there at all.

"Look Hawke, I know that I can't ask you not to see him, but I don't appreciate being lied to," he said. "Besides, there's no need. If you desire the company of someone else you need only say so and I would step aside."

"Oh it's that easy is it?" she asked feeling her hackles raise, "And step aside from what exactly? Haven't you already done that?"

He took a few steps closer to her, a look in his eyes that she couldn't read.

"Well that is where you're going isn't it? To see Anders? In the middle of the night?"

"No. Maybe. I don't know,"

"You don't know!?" he sneered.

"No! I don't know, and what if I am? That doesn't mean that I prefer his company to yours."

"So you would have us both?"

"I don't have either of you!" she yelled, feeling her voice go shrill. The words echoed off the courtyard buildings and startled them both.

He shifted his weight on his feet and the air hung heavy between them.

"Then what are you doing?" he asked, his tone softer ."It is not safe for you to be out here alone. I wish you would have woken me."

"I… guess I might just want to check on him. He is not well."

He stood there quietly for a moment.

"I said I wouldn't push you to talk about it, and I don't mean to, but…" he stopped. "It's the middle of the night."

Hawke's thoughts started racing. It was time to tell him something.

"He… he saved me." She said. Her heart was pounding hard at the thought of telling him everything. She couldn't, not everything. He would kill Anders. He would end whatever it was that was left between them, whatever this weird, in between state was. But maybe that's what she needed to have happen, maybe she just needed to be cut loose, or maybe it might scare him into actually making a decision. But looking into his face, it was impossible to imagine her life with him as just another person she saw occasionally. The thought of losing the closeness they had, the connection, ignited the ulcerous bolts of pain in her gut again. She couldn't.

"There was a... a demon… in a cave of apostates. I was unarmed, like a blighted fool, and.."

"Kind of like right now?" he snarled.

"Yes like right now!"she said.

She paused, trying to calm the feeling of wild panic that arose at reliving the nightmare.

"Apostates!" he spat, sneering angrily. "Well, go on."

"I was crippled. I felt all my bones crunch as I was thrown… and then," she raised a hand to her throat, feeling the chill of the memory crawl sickeningly up her spine. Fenris took another step closer and hovered inches away from her, his sneer disappearing into some other expression, something pained.

"You're not supposed to be able to put a soul back into its body once it's gone." She continued, "But he did. He reached deep into some kind of healing magic, and practically killed himself in the process." She paused. "And here I am. While he wastes away in his bed.

Fenris took another step closer, and reached up to smooth a clump of hair out of her face. His face was a mixture of emotions, some morphing of anger, fear and anguish.

She closed her eyes, feeling utterly defeated, yet again. The words weren't lies, but they weren't the truth.

"So I should be thanking him," Fenris said more gently as he caressed her cheek with his thumb. She quivered for a moment at the light touch.

"Not exactly. There is more to it…he blames himself. But I can't tell you more than that. I won't. I'm sorry," she said. He pulled his face back and she met his eyes finally. His dark brows were drawn, questioning.

"Justice," he said. "Was Justice the demon?"

Her heart started racing even faster. If she hadn't stumbled at saying his name earlier…

"It's my fault! We were so stupid to be unarmed!" She cried, trying not to lie, or confirm. But his eyes held onto the certainty that appeared when he had said the spirit's name.

One of his arms slid around her waist and pulled her up against him. She melted into him, despite the armor between them, and wrapped her own arms around his slender torso.

"Did you really expect anything different to come from magic?" He growled in disdain as he pulled his head back again.

"Magic saved me," she said.

"You wouldn't have needed saving in the first place without it!" he responded angrily.

"I don't disagree with you," She said as she pulled him close again.

"It's not exactly up for debate." Fenris said.

She stood there quietly, trying to take in the fact that he was finally holding her again, focusing on how heavenly it felt. But she also figured she should be preparing herself for the inevitable parting.

"Can you wait until morning to check on him?"

"He doesn't actually want to see me. I was going to slip in and check on him while he was sleeping."

Fenris's eyes again flashed dark, as this seemed to confirm his question about Justice. Why else would Anders refuse her, except due to guilt? She sighed. He really could read her like a book. Or maybe he could read everyone. It struck ice into her heart to think of the things that happened with Anders before the incident in the cave. Would he be able to see that too, somehow?

His face hovering so close to hers made her ache to kiss him, even as she felt that she didn't deserve his kisses. His arms were trembling with his anger now, and she figured he was probably only holding onto her out of the shock inspired by the story of her death. She began to doubt that, despite the fact of his embrace now, that anything would truly be different between them in the cold light of day. It made his embrace seem almost cruel. And being this close to him again only made her body sing with the memory of their one night together. The ache in her chest swelled, and she felt tears welling up behind her eyes. She looked up again and he was studying her face.

"What am I thinking now?" she asked.

"I don't know."

She pulled away from him and started walking back in the direction of her house, giving up whatever foolish errand she was on. They walked quietly the whole way, Fenris staying just a few steps behind, while Hawke's mind raced. She thought of their evening together, how close she felt to him, how comfortable it always was when it was the two of them, even at the same time that she was completely completely electrified by his presence. She thought of their night together months ago, and the memory of his kisses, of his naked body against hers, and the feelings it brought back just made her want to collapse onto her knees and get absorbed into the dirty streets of Kirkwall. How is a person supposed to keep going forward with memories like that? How is a person supposed to get out of bed and walk through their day acting like they hadn't lost the most beautiful thing that they had ever beheld?

But she hadn't lost him completely. He had held her close for a few moments in her time of need, and he continued to share his secrets with her, to trust her to know everything about him, even as she kept her own secrets from him. But she still ached for so much more. Was she just greedy? Selfish?

That was probably it, she figured. Just more reasons she didn't deserve Fenris in the first place.

And then there was Anders. He had held her too, had made her feel completely loved, had kissed her with everything he had. Those nights were beautiful. They didn't satisfy the hunger for Fenris, but they did soothe something deep inside her, and make her think that she could be happy in her life, sharing love with him for whatever time he had left. But things could probably never be the same between them again. They might, with some time, be able to find a new normal. But whatever promise that their nights together had made for them, that was gone too.

When they reached her doorstep, she turned to Fenris who stood close. Too close.

"Fenris," she started, but didn't know how to finish. He was quiet, dark eyes continuing to study her. She reached a hand up and smoothed back the silver hair that hung in his face. Her love for him was a big boulder of lead that sat inside her and weighed her down. He was so beautiful, looking at him hurt.

"I need some time, again. This is getting too hard for me to take. I…"she stopped, then figured she might as well lay it all out."I love you too much."

"Hawke…" he started. She waited. Now is your time if you have anything different to say, she thought. But whatever words he had begun, just died on his lips.

"I know," she sighed, "You can't."


	8. Chapter 8

**_********** 2 Months Earlier**********_**

Hawke was grateful that another long day of running around Kirkwall was over, and she exhaled with relief as she dropped her weighty daggers just inside the door of her Hightown mansion.

"Don't worry about those Bodahn. I'll come get them later," she said as she into the foyer.

"No need. It'll give me something useful to do Serah." He answered.

She crossed the room and checked the table that normally held her mail, seeing nothing new, and then stopped to give Tex a scratch.

"Aveline must take you out to the barracks again soon. I am sure you're just bouncing off the walls in here," she told her old mabari, but he was too busy sniffing at her boots.

"Probably smelling at least ten different kinds of shit. Plus some blood and piss in there for good measure." She said and he dropped to the floor and rolled over, the giant muscular hound baring his soft belly to her. Hawke knelt down and gave him a good rub. He was such a good dog, and was the main reason she never worried about her mother and the dwarves being alone in the house all day.

He closed his eyes and grunted as she moved up to his neck, letting her nails work deep into his fur and satisfy itches he could never reach himself. When she finally rose for the washroom he was on his feet in a quick motion, shaking out his coat.

She entered the washroom and dropped her heavy leathers on the floor, then splashed some water on her face and neck, scrubbing the day's accumulation of grime off her skin. She gave herself a quick once over with the water, telling herself she really need to have a tub filled soon for a proper bath. She rubbed the sore muscles in the back of her neck and walked unseeing up the stairs to her room, ready to collapse into her bed.

She was surprised to see Fenris pacing back and forth before her bedroom door, head cast down and face obscured by his shock of silver hair, as usual.

"Fenris?" she asked, and at the sound of her voice his trajectory turned toward her with a quickness that made her instinctively brace herself.

"I have been thinking of you." He said, bringing himself to an abrupt stop before her. He was exuding an intense energy, and she felt like the floor went out from under her feet, taking her breath with it.

"In fact, I have been able to think of little else."

For a brief moment, Hawke wanted to smile. Wanted to jump in the air and scream her joy. Months and months of longing for Fenris, and finally, finally it was happening.

When he looked up into her face she felt her heart quicken, felt the built up anticipation of night after night in his company rush into her throat, almost choking her. His big green eyes locked onto her face, sweeping down to rest upon on her lips.

They threw themselves into each other, their bodies clashing as their arms found holds around the other's waist and back and hips. The moment his lips finally touched hers she groaned in relief. Almost three years of aching to taste him had kept her permanently coiled into tense ball of restraint, constantly requiring renewed efforts to keep her urges in check. But finally he was here, and all that tension unwound itself as she opened up and brought him into her with a need so powerful she felt herself begin to tremble. She pulled at him where ever she could get a hold, around that slender waist of his and up to his face, running her hand nervously down the side of his long, graceful neck. And he pulled back with great strength, his hands bruising into her sides and gripping her hair as he mashed his mouth into hers, tongue exploring her mouth and tasting faintly of wine. For such a hard man, his lips were as soft as satin pillows.

The force he was using made her body sing, and was a welcome invitation for her to unleash her own. She turned him and pushed him up against the wall, his body making a hard thud even as he pulled her in to him, his lips finding hers again within an instant. She could almost barely register the reality of what was happening over her racing heart and shaky limbs. An excruciating culmination of wanting, loving, fantasizing about this man was being realized, and it was almost bigger than her mind could process. It wasn't just that she wanted him. She needed him, a need as real as air for her lungs.

Fenris's arms circled her again and again, leaving briefly to cup her cheek and hold her face as his mouth explored hers, and then returning to surround and envelope her. She exhaled the large breath she was holding, that she felt like she'd been holding for ages, and melted completely into his touch while still trying to kiss him furiously. She raised herself up on her tip toes to press as much of he rself against him as she could, wanting to feel the bones under his muscles, the heartbeat under his armor. Wanting to rip a hole in his chest and crawl inside. Hawke's whole body was wracked with an urgency more intense than anything she had ever known in her life. She could almost cry out, but she stifled the urging in her throat. They were still outside of her bedroom, and still fully clothed. Their hands had barely even begun exploring.

They made it into the bedroom somehow and collapsed together on the bed. Finally she opened her eyes and slowed herself a little bit. She wanted to see him. He was the prize at the end of years worth of patience, of a lifetime of hardships and loss. His eyes were cast downward as together they removed his armor, piece by piece. It was tight, made specifically for his body and almost molded to him, and not easy to remove.

She giggled nervously at the effort it took just to unclasp a shoulder piece, but quieted herself when he just looked at her with dark, unreadable eyes. His face moved into hers again as their fingers flew to find and unclip fastenings, but when his lips touched hers it was all she could do not to go completely limp and stall all progress.

Finally it was off and she was breathless again as she let her eyes fall over his body. She had seen him once before, when she took him up to the pool on the Wounded Coast to swim, but the golden firelight beside them now seemed to make his whole body shimmer with a new brilliance. The blue markings curled over his arms and chest, crawling down the sides of his torso to curl over his thighs, but his rippled belly was bare, as was his lower back. He was toned and lean, and had that lanky but svelte elven proportioning that she had never really given much thought to before he had come along. She had never been interested in an elf before, and certainly never expected that she should fall so absurdly hard for one.

"I have wanted this for so long," she breathed, as she looked deep into his eyes, feeling her heart begin to ache. Something in her was beginning to feel very scared.

"I'm sorry I have kept you waiting," he whispered back.

She moved again into his mouth in part to stifle the tears she felt building up. She was being completely overtaken, vanquished. She was standing on a precipice of an ocean that could swallow her up completely, and while she couldn't wait to dive in and drown herself, she had the sense that needing something outside herself as much as she needed Fenris could be utterly crippling.

He had mentioned once about the pain, so she tried to start out gently, tracing her fingers on the areas of his skin not scarred with the lyrium brandings. She kissed down the unmarked skin of his abdominals, tracing their lines with her tongue and letting her mouth move lower and lower, trying to avoid the blue markings but desiring to take him completely into her mouth if she could manage it. But when he grabbed her and effortlessly flipped her on her back and clawed at her clothes until they were gone, she gave up any attempt at restraint. She let her hands take in every bulge and crevice, every smooth expanse and hidden softness in him that they could find. His skin was hot and he didn't wince or flinch, or give any indication that she should be careful where she touched. Instead he arched and groaned, and drew deep ragged breaths. So she let herself loose. She wanted to consume him, take a piece of him inside of her that would never leave. A hot wetness spilled down her face and she realized they were tears, but she wasn't sure why she crying. She bit at his lips and dug into his shoulder and back. His open mouth sucked hard at her throat, moving around to run his teeth up her neck and then the line of her jaw. He bit down on her bottom lip and then claimed her mouth with his again. She couldn't stop the groans coming from her if she wanted to, as his every touch trilled an almost unbearably sweet vibration through her. Her thighs grew slick with her desperation for him and his hips rolled over hers, grinding himself into her until finally he had entered her without any assistance, instantly shooting a bolt of the most intense pleasure she had ever felt up into her belly.

_They moved together in a rhythm that pushed her up, pleasure building and rising along with the cries from her throat, threatening to drop her over its cliff for the long fall back down. It was pleasure so permeating that she felt it could crush her completely, grinding her body into dust and she would die as a particulate cloud of bliss. She almost wanted to die there. How could anything else in the world, any time spent outside of these moments with Fenris, ever, ever be anything other than wasted time? She wrapped her legs around him completely, caging him in with the entirety of her body, and together they writhed, twisting under the current of sensations. When he arched his back, a deep groan rumbled in his throat, and she put her mouth to his neck, sucking at the vibrations that reverberated there from the growl of his voice._

Afterward they lay throbbing together as they panted and sucked in air, beads of sweat squeezing out from between expanses of joined skin, tickling down her sides and thighs. One bead slid from the hollow of his neck down to the pillow below his head and Hawke followed the trail it left with her fingertip, then dipped her tongue to taste the salty wetness. He ran his fingers through her hair and pulled her in rest in his arms. With her ear to his chest, she closed her eyes and let her spirit soar to the music of his lungs filling with air and then draining, cherishing the breaths of life that allowed her love to exist in the world.

"You are… magnificent," he breathed as he tightened his embrace and kissed the top of her head. She looked up at him, hair dampened and plastered against his face and his lips came down to meet hers again, tasting metallic with the bruising that brought the blood so close to the surface.

She had not intended to sleep, wanting to stay awake and enjoy being in his arms for as long as she could, all night long if necessary. Now that something real with Fenris was finally happening she needed to soak in every possible second, to make up for years of trembling fingers held in check, words bitten back, aching feelings kept hidden and quiet. But their lovemaking had been so intense, she had expended every last ounce of energy on him. And she had already felt exceedingly drained when she got home in the first place. Sleep claimed her despite all her attempts to fight it, but she had no reason to believe she wouldn't wake the next morning still in his arms.


	9. Chapter 9

Hawke was disappointed when Varric warned her to keep her distance from Anders.

"I really don't think it would help right now, kid. I'm handling it," he'd told her when she seeked him out at the Hanged Man. She'd been trying to distract herself as much as possible in order to keep her mind, and her feet, from wandering over to his clinic at random hours. But it was not easy. She was keeping her distance from Fenris too, and while her days were filled with the usual Kirkwall business, they were increasingly lonely.

Hawke blinked her eyes in disbelief when Anders walked through the door of her library of his own accord, looking weary and thin, but not the ghost she had pulled from his bed three weeks ago now. She scrambled to her feet, wanting to rush to him and pull him into her arms, but she stopped herself.

"Anders?"

"Hello," he said simply as he hovered just inside the door. Her mind started racing through all the things she wanted to say to him. Now that there was a bit more distance between her and the events in the cave, she had found herself thinking back more and more to the days just before that.

"I'm… I'm so happy to see you," she said.

"You are? Why?"

"Why?" she almost laughed. "Because I have been so worried about you."

"Well, I'm still here. For some reason," he said.

She took a few tentative steps out from behind the table toward him. "I'm glad," she said.

He gave a small laugh, "how can you say that? If you have forgiven what I've done, then you're a fool."

"Yes, I am definitely that," she answered seriouslys. She took another small step toward him. Would he let her hug him at least, she wondered? His eyes got sad for a moment, his brows flickering in a frown. "I don't really know why I came here. I guess I just thought it was time," he said.

He wasn't withdrawing so she kept taking slow steps toward him. She felt like she was trying to approach an abused, frightened animal.

"Anders…" she started, "I was afraid you'd never want to see me again."

"Isn't that what I should be saying? I am the offending party here, and I… I still am what I am," he said. "Thank you, by the way, for not telling everyone. I was sure I'd be facing a lynch mob once everyone learned what I did to you."

"It wasn't you that did it."

"Not willingly, but those were my hands."

Hawke was close enough now that she could reach out and touch him. Any remaining anger she had was melting away, and all that she felt was a deep relief that he was there, looking normal and no longer on the brink of emaciation.

She reached out for one of his hands and took it into her own. "I'm just glad you're okay." This time his hand was warm, and held hers back.

"I'm not actually. Not at all," he said, his eyes deepening.

"Well, me either. But we're both still standing here. For now anyway. That's something."

"I guess so," he said. "Are your nightmares any better?"

"A little. But you need to be able to sleep in the first place to have nightmares," she answered.

"Yes, you do look tired. I could probably give you something for that. I have a potion recipe that is quite good for sleep.."

"I… actually yes, I think I would like that," she said.

"Good. Maybe that'll finally help you stay out of the streets at night."

Hawke sighed. "Where else am I supposed to go for a walk to clear my head? Sometimes that's the only thing that helps."

"Well it'll help you straight into the grave. For good this time. No one wants to see that."

"I'm not so sure about that."

"Well okay, none of your friends want that. Maybe some others might…" he gave a small joking smile.

"Anders?"

"Yes."

"Can I hold you, just for a moment? Please?"

His face fell, looking scared and pale, and he gave a small nod.

Hawke pulled him in and wrapped her arms around him. She could feel his ribs through his robes and the protruding bones of his shoulders under her hands. He rest his head in the crook of her neck, and she reached up to caress his hair. She held him tightly, trying to shower him in warmth, and hoping that it might help soothe him somehow. No doubt he still wrestled with the memories the way she did, or probably more so. She had wished on so many occasions over the past few week that she had someone who would pull her into their arms and just hold her for a while. Fenris probably would have if she'd gone to him, but she feared that that would only have ended up causing her more pain, and she had been trying to keep their interactions as clean and simple as possible. But the truth was, she needed this as much as Anders.

Finally she felt his hands press more strongly on her back, and begin to fully embrace her in return. She nestled her head into his neck and breathed in the clean scent of his hair, finally feeling a little comforted herself. He smelled the same, the way he had in the tent and in the room at the Inn. It invoked vivid memories, bringing with them the urge to feel his kisses again, but knew that would just complicate what was already a complete mess. Instead she pulled back gently, letting him unwrap himself from her in his own time.

"Thank you," she said. "I needed that too."

He kept his face cast to the floor as he took soft steps backward toward the door.

"I gotta..." He began as he retreated pointing to the exit, "Come by the clinic sometime and I'll get you that potion," he said quietly.

She watched him walk away, feeling the same despair at his departure that she had felt the night he had left her alone in his room.

The days were long, empty and unending. Her heart just was not in the usual business of collecting debts, fighting troublemakers and going on scavenger hunts. When Fenris insisted upon coming along on a trip out to the Wounded Coast to seek some slavers that were rumored to be in the area, she did her best not to look at him unless she had to. Every once in a while she felt his eyes on her or saw them in the corner of her vision, shining large, luminous and worried. But instead of turning to face him, she would turn her back or walk away. She wasn't trying to be hurtful or punishing, but she was tired of aching all the time, and his eyes could make her ache even when she wasn't looking directly at them. The safest bet was to just get out of their line of sight entirely. At one point he walked up to her to ask if they could slip away to visit the pool. She told him it wasn't a good day for it, even though she had already been wanting to do the same thing herself. The thought of seeing him loose and easy, and half naked, was exactly the sort of thing that she needed to avoid.

She had been making more of an effort to eat after she began to feel her leathers grow looser and looser. She realized she had been avoiding aggravating her already raw stomach with food, but knew she needed to do something about it when she began feeling the effects in her fighting. She tired quickly and felt weaker. Less wine, more eating, she decided, and had been doing reasonably well at forcing herself to at least have two full meals a day. Anders had also commented on her thinness during one of her regular visits for his sleep potion, and the last thing she wanted was for her friends to begin to doubt her ability to hold her own in a fight. They all relied on each other when they were out working. She had always been the strongest link in the group, but somewhere along the way she found herself feeling like the one about to break, letting everyone else down. That, along with so many other things, simply needed to change.

"You're going through these awfully fast." Anders commented on her last visit to his clinic. "You're only using one per night?"

"Yes," she answered, "But I might have dropped one or two by accident." He eyed her suspiciously.

"Why don't I believe you?"

"Well even if I did take more than one, they won't hurt me, right?" she asked impatiently.

"No. But you don't need more than one. If you can stay awake after taking just one then you've got other problems."

"Well that's not it anyway," she said.

He gave her a questioning look, but she broke from his eyes, and stood to leave.

"Thanks again," she said, turning toward the door.

"Hawke," he called and stopped, "If you need to talk… you can come by anytime."

"Are you sure about that?"

"Or we could meet at the Hanged Man, if you'd prefer."

She turned back to look at him and nodded a wary acceptance, and then strode out the door.

The fact was that on two different days she had feigned sick and stayed in bed sleeping all day. The potions knocked her out completely, and kept all dreams at bay, which was a welcome respite from her normal, nightmare plagued sleep, which could barely be considered sleeping at all. She hadn't meant to do it, it just happened. She woke up and found herself completely unable to bear facing the day ahead, and couldn't even pinpoint the reasons why. And once the potions were drunk, there was no going back. She woke from a solid day and night's sleep with her head throbbing, throat parched and desperately needing to attend the call of nature. But she had been grateful for the break from life. And about a week later, the same thing happened again.

Even if she could sleep, keeping the dreams at bay was the potion's greatest gift. Before she went to Anders the nightmares had started featuring more than just glowing faces and creeping blackness. They began to include glowing bodies and twisting bedsheets.

She was surprised at Anders' invitation. He too had seemed to be trying to keep some distance from her, which she expected and understood. And as much as she would enjoy his company, she felt cautious. She wanted to talk to him, wanted to reclaim the friendship they'd had before everything went to shit, but knew it could never be that simple, for him or for her.

That night she stood in her room with a bottle of potion in her hand, ready to throw back the pungent liquid and fall into bed. But instead she froze with the vial just inches from her lips, replaced the stopper and put her boots back on. She grabbed her blades, and exited the house as quietly as possible. She knew she'd hear no end of grief if certain people found out she was out wandering the streets in the middle of the night again, but she decided she would use this walk as an exercise in stealth. That was supposed to be her specialty anyway, and normally she could slip undetected into and out of any really dark area. It was nice to be able to relax and just wander where her mind wanted to go, but if she couldn't do that, she could at least get in some useful practice.

She closed the front door behind her quietly, and looked around the courtyard to map out the shadows leading to all the exits into other parts of the city. She kept her footsteps light and silent as she moved from one shadow to the other, making her way in the darkness from her front door toward the stairwell on the farthest side. She had barely gone twenty steps when she heard a light scraping sound. She froze, all her senses now on high alert. Someone was there, somewhere in the darkness. She squinted deep into the shadows of the courtyard and saw nothing. The closest anyone could be would be one of the passageways. She was sure she could make it across the courtyard and to the exit she was already pointed toward without anyone being the wiser, but now she was curious. She heard another sound, so light it had barely registered, and she probably wouldn't have heard at all if she wasn't actively listening. It seemed to come from the passageway on the other side of her house.

She turned around, and crept silently through the shadows back to her door, and then to the area of the sound. She was grateful that there was no moon tonight, and that the shadows were as black as pitch. When she reached the edge of the house she stopped and waited, listening again. Slowly, she peeked around the corner, and let the corridor of blackness settle under her vision, revealing deeper levels of shapes and shadows within the wall of darkness. At the end of the corridor was definite movement, but she couldn't make out number of people or their position. She slid around the corner avoiding the bushes planted along the collonnades, and keeping her back as close to the wall of the house as she could without touching. Without a sound, she made her way down the passageway and toward the movement. It seemed to just be a single person, and it too was clearly skilled in the arts of stealth.

She took a few more steps and got close enough that she could make out the outline of a tall, slender body. When the figure turned, she caught the sharp angles of the head and armor of a distinct and familiar figure. She was surprised, but didn't know if she should be. But what was Fenris doing out here? She also noticed with a start that he was coming toward her. Had he seen or heard her? She didn't think it was possible, but now she watched the shadow get closer, on a definite collision course with her own position. Caught momentarily off guard, she took a careless step back, and her foot scraped just enough to make him freeze in place. Now he'd heard her for sure. She froze too, hearing the pounding of her heart grow in her ears. Should she just say something? More importantly, did she want to endure whatever conversation followed?

His shadow retreated one step at a time. He must not be able to see her, she thought. Looking around her, she knew that was impossible, as she was deep inside an inky blackness. She began to feel a little amused, and decided to wait and see where he was going to go. They hadn't spoken at all in a week, and in the weeks before that all their conversations had been relatively short, and mostly about business.

She blinked through the darkness for his shape, but couldn't locate it again. He must have found a particularly good shadow in which to hide in himself. Hawke waited, listening for any sounds of his movement, but nothing came. She took a tentative step forward, slowly working her way back down the corridor. The shadows were all empty. Giving up, she stepped out of her position and said, "Fenris?" She kept her voice low, but if he was close, he would hear it. But only silence greeted her in return. She crept softly over to the area where he was originally sighted, and found still nothing.

So she had caught him, waiting, loitering about outside her house. But where was he going when he had started advancing on her? Was he coming to talk? Was he somehow expecting, or sensing that she would be out here tonight? Her heart felt heavy again as she thought about what it might mean.

Fenris cared deeply about her. He always had. She'd be a fool not to see that. All the ways that he was there for her, how he looked at her, how he allowed her to entry into all his darkest places, something he offered no one else. Of course he cared. A deep regret began to swell up within her at how cold she had been to him over the past weeks. He was just trying to survive in this world just like she was, trying to heal from his past and find the best way forward. She ached to be around him, but her life with him in the outskirts was no better. She could at least speak with him, she thought. At least be kind to him. She started taking her silent steps in the darkness again, this time pointed toward his house.

He was sitting on the stoop of his stairs with his head hanging heavily in his hands. Around his right wrist was tied a ribbon of bright red.

"Fenris," she said softly as she approached him. He hadn't heard her coming and his head shot up in surprise, but he made no response. She lowered herself to sit beside him on the stairs and looked over at him, only a silhouette in the darkness.

In a swift movement he turned and caught her face, laying his lips gently on hers. At first she startled and reached up for his hands, but then relaxed and felt herself getting pulled into his kiss. His lips were as satiny soft as she remembered them and tasted again of wine. She opened her mouth and felt his tongue slide in, instantly flooding her whole body with warmth as her blood started flowing faster in her veins. She kissed him back feverishly, feeling her love for him pulling heavy on her heart, but she tried to restrain herself. As much as this was exactly what she wanted, she couldn't just let her guard down again so easily.

The kiss ended with a sigh, and he pulled his face back, reaching a hand up to smooth back her hair. She had her hands at his face too, and gave his cheek one last caress, drinking in his velvet skin with her hands for a final second before pulling gently away.

He leaned his head down to rest on her shoulder. "I wish I could be what you want me to be," he whispered.

She lowered her face to his hair and inhaled, kissing his temple. His statement only intensified her painful pangs of regret. She had spent so much time wrapped up in her own feelings that she had neglected to give much consideration to his.

"I know," she said quietly.

"Maybe someday I'll get there."

"If you do, I'll be here."

"But how long will you wait for me Hawke?"

"As long as I can."

"I'll understand if you can't."

"I know."


	10. Chapter 10

Three months later, Hawke found herself inside the Hanged Man, staring at a terrible hand of cards and wishing that the ground would open below her and swallow her up. She downed her flagon of ale while wrestling with the desire to fold and sit out a hand for the fourth time in a row. Varric had thought that a friendly card game would help get everyone's spirits up, but that endeavor was failing spectacularly. Even he and Isabela had had little to say over the past hour, though they did seem to be getting a perverse enjoyment from watching Hawke squirm while Anders and Fenris glared at each other from opposite ends of the table. Fenris apparently had the same idea as Hawke, as he threw down his hand of cards angrily and stomped over to the bar. He signaled the bartender for another refill, and then turned his eyes to her, softening slightly as she offered him a sympathetic look. Then his eyes flicked quickly over to her left and his brows furrowed again. Habitually following his line of sight, she found Anders' big brown eyes burning at her from beneath loose strands of dark blonde hair.

Anders had shown up at the Hanged Man without his usual ponytail. The unruly blonde mane hung touseled and windblown around his face and Hawke was startled by the visceral reaction she had when he first approached, appearing the absolute picture of so many very specific memories. She gulped again at her ale in an attempt to help file those memories back into the recesses of her mind, but every time she glanced at him she was thrown back in time again. Even Isabela raised an eyebrow and looked him up and down as he took his place at the table, but he payed her no attention. While Anders had been making great strides back to normalcy, including finally reopening his clinic, he retained a new quietness that sometimes made everyone forget he was there. Everyone but Hawke.

Anders was next to throw down his cards, just tossing them into the middle of the table without saying a word.

Varric and Isabela looked at each other, and then eyed Hawke questioningly, seeming to receive their answer in her frown.

"Well that was the worst game of Wicked Grace ever," Varric remarked as he started pulling all the cards back into a pile. Isabela sighed dramatically and rose to walk around the table and seat herself in next to Anders.

"So, what will it take to cheer you up?" she asked him.

Hawke excused herself from the table, having no interest in staying just to watch Isabela work her seductive magic, and with her flagon in hand she crossed the room to Fenris. She was approaching from behind when a busty blonde women squeezed around Hawke and slid herself up to the bar beside him, tossing her hair back.

"Hey sugar," came a sultry voice.

"No." Fenris reponded gruffly. Hawke stopped in her tracks to listen.

"But I haven't even asked you anything yet."

"Still, no. I am not available or interested."

"Alright, alright. I can take a hint. Andraste's ass, but you're not very pleasant at all are you?"

Fenris let out a low grumble and turned to find Hawke standing several feet away quietly stifling a laugh. He rolled his eyes, "I'm glad you found that amusing," he remarked and then turned toward an empty table in the corner of the room.

"I did, thank you."

"So tell me again why I haven't skewered our resident apostate?" he scowled as they took their seats.

"I honestly don't know the answer to that question," she said taking a drink of her warm ale.

"Are you implying that I have your blessing?" he said incredulously.

"Nope," she said taking another drink. "Not at all."

"Well the next time I see even a hint of that demon I am going to."

"If Anders turns into a demon here I will skewer him myself."

"And yet you remain friends with him."

"We have been through a lot together, and I enjoy his company,".

His scowl deepened and he picked up his newly filled flagon and drained it, slamming it back down on the table completely empty.

"Just how much do you enjoy his company exactly? It must be a considerable amount to overlook..."

"Fenris…don't." she interrupted, and he grumbled under his breath again. She cast her eyes down, trying to erase any incriminating expression off her face.

"You know, you have never confirmed if Justice was the demon in the cave," he said, his dark eyes watching her closely. Hawke was stunned for a moment. She was sure he had not needed her confirmation since he seemed to figure it out that night in the courtyard. Had that been the reason he hadn't retaliated? Hawke had been sure that he would have. She sat there silently, frozen. She couldn't confirm it, but she couldn't lie to him either.

"Refusing to answer is as good as a confirmation," he said. Hawke searched her brain for something truthful she could say that wasn't an outright yes, but came up short.

"You would protect him? After that?" he asked her, voice sounding increasingly angry.

"He's my friend, Fenris. I protect all of my friends."

"He is an abomination," he spat, "And he hurt you. More than that, he…" He stopped and sat there fuming silently, and she saw his markings flicker with a dull awakening.

"Fenris, I understand. I do. I wanted nothing to do with him at first either, but he was victim of the whole thing just like I was. Can you imagine what that must be like? Please, just try to calm yourself."

"No," he sneered. "I will not."

"You will not harm him, especially not here, not right now."

"Watch me," he growled as his marking flared and he cast an icy glare across the room.

"Fenris!" She barked, beginning to feel impatient. But she had expected this to happen at some point. It had only been a matter of time before they were all in the same room again. She'd been able to avoid it since they returned from the trip four and a half months ago, but she knew that this was inevitable. Her heart was in her throat, but she was also slightly impressed that Fenris hadn't flown at Anders an hour ago. He'd already been showing an unusual amount of self restraint.

She laid a calming hand on the bare skin of his arm, which was hot and firm.

"Don't," he said sharply.

"Fenris."

He shot up out of his chair and stalked across the room toward the door, glaring openly at Anders the whole way. The door slammed heavily behind him, causing several heads to turn.

Hawke exhaled the breath she'd been holding and sank back into her chair. That had actually gone a bit better than she was expecting, but she was sure that wouldn't be the end of it. She had been able to feel Fenris's contempt building during the card game and knew that something would probably be said at some point, but as long as there wasn't an all out battle in the middle of the Hanged Man, she would consider the night a resounding success.

She rose to get a refill from the bar, and then collapsed back down at the table, feeling the tension she'd been carrying for the whole evening finally begin to ebb.

Isabela and Anders remained at their table, and from her distance and angle she could see that Isabela had stretched a leg toward him and was nudging her foot at his calf. Before she looked away, she saw Anders' brown eyes flash in her direction. She sighed, and turned her attention to the bar, where Varric also sat. He raised his flagon in silent acknowledgment, and then gave her an expression that indicated his own relief.

She took another drink, and closed her eyes, glad the disastrous attempt at cards was finally over, and glad that Fenris had finally decided to go brood in the privacy of his own home. She knew he wasn't ready to be followed yet, and would probably come to her later and apologize on his own. Not that he actually had anything to apologize for, she realized. Maybe she should go to him, she thought, once he'd had enough time to calm down.

Startling her, Anders dropped into the chair that Fenris had just vacated.

"So. You and Fenris are on again," he remarked. Hawke took another drink. It was the first time in three months that Anders had asked her anything about the state of affairs with Fenris.

"Well, no, not exactly," she said. "I mean, maybe a little, sort of, but… not technically."

"Well that's not confusing at all."

"Tell me about it," she sighed, exasperated.

"And you're alright with that?"

"Well… no, not really. But I understand that it's not easy for him, so it's fine. I mean, it's not great for me. But it's fine. It has to be."

Anders gave a soft, derisive laugh."This just gets clearer by the second." He took a drink out of his own mug, and Hawke glanced across the room at Isabela, who was sitting back in her chair watching them with her eyebrow raised.

"How exactly is that fine? If he wanted to be with you, he would be wouldn't he?"

"It's not that simple," she responded.

"Seems like it should be."

"Should it? Would it be so simple for you and me to be together after what we went through?"

"Well, I guess I can concede that point." Hawke met Anders' studying gaze, a gaze she had seen before under soft lantern light, and she felt her cheeks flush. "So then what's with the ribbon he's wearing now? That's your color. Is it some sort of 'promise to someday maybe love you back' ribbon?"

"I don't know. It might be something like that I guess. At the very least it lets everyone know he's working for me, so he can travel around town with fewer issues. But I didn't actually ask him to wear it. Speaking of, did you lose your hair tie?" she asked.

"I did actually. What, you don't like it?" he asked as he ran his hand through the blonde shag, "I thought you liked my hair. Isabela sure seems to."

"And yet you left her over there, all by herself."

"Did I? Oh I guess I did."

Hawke snorted, "you didn't notice that she was running her foot up your leg?"

"Of course I noticed. But I guess I'm just a little… distracted."

"That seems to be your permanent state now."

He nodded quietly and took another drink. "Can I ask you something serious?"

"Of course."

"Where do you think you and I would be right now if things hadn't gone so wrong back in that cave?"

Her heart fluttered at the question, and she paused to think. "I, um. I honestly don't know. It's possible that we would still be right here and nothing would be different. It's also possible that we would be naked in bed right now," she said as she met his eyes briefly, startling again at how much something as simple as hair could conjure up old memories.

"Ouch. That's a little cruel."

"Is it? What, the being in bed part? I'm sorry. But you did ask,"

"Right, I did didn't I? Well can I ask you another question?"

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but that was a question. Two, technically."

"My, you're a little prickly tonight."

"I know, I'm sorry," she sighed. "I'm just tired, and feeling a bit off my game."

"I guess that's to be expected after that unbearable last hour," he said and then paused. Hawke waited, trying not to let herself get caught up in a wash of old, familiar feelings.

"Aren't you afraid of me? Or Justice? The last thing I expected is that you might still want to be… friends."

"Honestly, yes, I am. But in truth, you should probably also be afraid of me," she answered. "Fenris too of course, but mostly me."

"And why is that?"

"Because if Justice, or Vengeance or whatever that thing is, makes an appearance around me again, I am probably going to kill you."

"Right. I guess I shouldn't be surprised at that."

Hawke sighed again, and leaned forward to let her head fall to the table with a thunk. She closed her eyes and tried to clear her mind of the images flashing behind her eyelids. This was the last thing she needed, she thought. She stretched out a hand and reached blindly across the table until her hand came upon his.

"Please don't make me kill you," she mumbled as she gave it a little squeeze, and then pulled it away quickly.

"I'll try," he said with a sad laugh, "I suppose if I had to die at anyone's hands, I would want it to be yours."

"It would only be fair." She said wryly.

"If I could I would off myself the moment I felt him come out again, but it's not that easy," he said quietly as he shook his head. "You sure know how to pick your companions, Hawke,"

"I know," she sighed, mashing her forehead into the wood of the table. It smelled of dirty dishwater.

"Why DO you still want to be friends? By all rights you should want nothing to do with me ever again. I wouldn't blame you for that you know."

She rolled her head back up to look into his face. His eyes were cast down, looking soulful and quiet. "I told you before, I like the complicated ones."

His lips flicked up into a small smile, "You're a little complicated yourself."

"If by complicated you mean an absolute mess, then yes. Sure," she said, "I guess they're basically the same thing, aren't they?"

"Isn't that the truth. Well at least you're a beautiful mess," said Anders.

She snorted, "Ah, I see you really are back to your old self."

"Nah, I think someone must have just slipped something into my drink. Probably Isabela."

"It's really nice to see you looking better though."

"Well appearances can be deceiving. But no one wants the company of a self pitying fool."

"I do," she said.

"Only because I tell you that you're beautiful."

"Well, that doesn't hurt."

"Or maybe you're just mad," he laughed softly.

"That could be it, too."

"You must be, to love him so much," he snarled as he motioned at the door.

"You'll get no argument from me there."

Anders went quiet again for a moment, taking a long sip of his ale.

"Does Fenris know?"

"Know which part?"

"About Justice. I saw him over here earlier. It's a good thing those markings don't give his eyes daggers or I'd already be dead."

"He does."

"So you told him?"

"I told him the parts that I had to, and he figured out the rest for himself."

"Are you telling me there's a brain inside that little hothead?" Anders smirked, "Will wonders never cease."

Hawke flashed him a disapproving look. "Underestimate him at your own peril. He is very sharp, in fact."

"Right, sure, and in more ways than one," he said, "He doesn't know about what happened between us though."

"No, he doesn't. Not yet."

"You plan to tell him?"

"No," she answered softly, "but I fear he'll be able to figure that out on his own too."

"Well, you could just leave him. And come back to me," Anders said. Hawke looked up expecting to see him smirking, but his face was serious, his eyes boring deep into her in a way that made butterflies take flight in her stomach.

"Then you'd really be dead," she answered.

"I'll be dead soon anyway."

"And I'm supposed to hand my heart over to someone who intends to die on me so quickly?" she asked. "Besides, how could you possibly want me again when you could barely even look at me for so long?"

"I don't know. You're right, it doesn't make any sense. But now that I am looking at you again, I can't seem to stop."

"You don't think of that night in the cave anymore? That something like that might happen again?"

"I do. And it eats at me, more than you could possibly know. But so do… the nights that came before that. I can't stop thinking about them. About what could have been," he said softly. "I don't know which of the two is worse."

"Anders…" she began, but was interrupted when Isabela appeared at the table side, looking down on them with a suspicious half smile. She dropped a full bottle of whiskey and three shot glasses onto the table between them, and Hawke closed her mouth and sat up straight in her chair again.

"Sorry to interrupt what looks like a fascinating conversation,"she began, "but you two have been such sad sacks for months now, and I think it's time for you to loosen up a bit."

Isabela seated herself, and began pouring the brown liquor into the glasses, "You two are drinking with me. I'll hear no argument about it. I refuse to drink alone, and the other prospects here tonight are even more depressing than you," she stopped to toss back a shot, "which I didn't even think was possible." She finished, and then filled her own glass again.

"Prospects?" Hawke asked. Isabela gave her a sly smile and winked.

"I can't. I can't do the hard stuff," said Anders shaking his head.

"Oh shut it. You've drank with me before already, so your excuses are not going to work," said Isabela as she slid a full shotglass toward him. "At least one shot certainly isn't going to kill you. Maybe two."

"It might actually."

"Well at least that'll stop your moping," she said while pushing a glass over to Hawke. Anders flashed Hawke a look that seemed to be asking for her help, but she could only give an apologetic shrug. The last time she had gotten drunk was the night Fenris found her in the street in the middle of the night. After the last hour sitting between Fenris and Anders, she needed the release. But she also wasn't sure she wanted to sit there all night while Isabela flirted with Anders, and Anders gave her puppy dog eyes.

"Bottoms up!" declared Isabela, and Hawke picked up her glass, throwing the contents back and swallowing with a wince. Anders sighed resignedly and did the same.

"Ugh, you couldn't at least have brought a better bottle?" he said with a sour face.

"Must you complain about everything? You're as bad as the elf," said Isabela.

"You take that back!" said Anders laughed.

"See! You feel better already. Here, have another."

In the time it took Anders to finish his next shot, Hawke had already picked up the bottle of whiskey and downed two more of her own in quick succession.

"Careful, Hawke. You don't want to make it too early of a night." Isabela said.

"I do actually. Sorry," she said as she stood and gave them a nod. She turned and walked out of the Hanged Man.

Hawke stopped several steps outside the door and breathed in the night air. It was dank and smelled of garbage as was the norm in Lowtown, but the air was cool and a nice breeze brushed against her face. The sun had only been down for an hour, which she was glad for since she could feel the whiskey making her head swim pleasantly, and she did not want to have be on high alert for her walk home. If she had waited any longer, she'd have to use the passage by Anders' clinic, but this earlyon in the evening, both Low and High town should still be largely devoid of the usual shady characters.

The last three months had been strange. Since the conversation with Fenris on his stoop, Fenris had become this strange combination of distant and possessive. In fact, there was a good chance that on her walk home, Fenris would emerge from some shadow to walk behind her. Making sure she was safe, since she couldn't be trusted to just go straight home, he said. She didn't mind that he looked out for her, but if she said nothing to him for the entire walk home, he wouldn't speak either, even to say goodnight. They could go the whole hour without saying a word, and then once she reached her door he would just keep walking. It wasn't always so bad, as sometimes she didn't want to talk herself. But the in-between stage was wearing on her. They were more than friends, but not lovers. He looked at her with love, but she couldn't touch him. She was sure the markings had something to do with that, but since he had shown no signs of pain during their one night together, she had no idea how much. They were a beautiful, enigmatic, frustrating curse.

Several blocks down the road, she heard footsteps behind her, moving quick and light.

She turned her head expecting to see Fenris, popped out of some shadow to escort her home, but was surprised to see Anders instead.

"Poor Isabela," Hawke remarked, "the girl can't catch a break tonight."

Anders said nothing, and Hawke glanced at him again to see a fierceness in his eyes that was entirely unexpected. He didn't look back at her, just walked, face turned straight ahead. He matched her speed and came up right beside her, and without saying a word, his hand closed tight around her arm and he diverted her into a small alley quicker than she could question him.

With a thud she found herself up against the wall, Anders hands still holding her upper arms with a surprising strength, and then his lips mashed down on hers. For the first few seconds Hawke was too stunned to react other than to raise her hands in preparation to push him off. But then she smelled his familiar scent, and felt his arms wrapping around her, pulling her to him tightly, and his lips were those same, soft, skilled lips that she remembered, and she hesitated. It was so difficult being around someone she desired all the time and never getting to touch them, she realized. Her body often burned with a need that she couldn't ask Fenris to satisfy. Just a few more seconds, she told herself, and then I'll push him off and get mad and tell him I love Fenris, and we can't. I will do it, but first, just a few more seconds…

She laid her hands on his chest, ready to push, but found the body under her hands was solid and warm, and she could feel his heart pounding even through the thick leather of his coat. He kissed deeply, his breath coming ragged through his nose, his tongue washing over hers and causing her increasingly racing heart to roar like a series of waves in her ears. Her hands didn't obey her, and she found them on his face, sliding around the back of his neck, pulling down at the collar of his coat, grabbing a handful of his hair by the roots and squeezing. They were everywhere except pushing him away as they should have been.

No, that is not what should be happening. This can't happen. This has to stop. I love Fenris, she kept saying in her head.

She was just about to finally push him off when he pressed the full length of his body against her, and she felt her traitorous limbs go weak while a sharp wave of desire rippled through her belly, reverberating powerfully between her legs. Her body remembered him, remembered what he had been able to do to her, and had begun to take on a mind of its own.

She broke from his kiss and she finally conjured up the voice to tell him to stop, but the "No" on the tip of her tongue turned into something else when his mouth found her neck and bit her, his teeth scraping against her skin. The word turned into a groan that only deepened when one of his hands reached up to close around her breast, fingertips pulling down at the top of her leathers and curling under to her skin beneath. Her mind was contesting loudly, but her body was even louder, drowning out all her protestations with a need that was all consuming. She realized her legs had opened and she was grinding into him, her hips moving almost of their own volition, obeying the calling to get him closer, deeper.

His hands came up and closed strongly around her arms, pulling her deeper into the alley so that they were both cloaked in shadow. For the few steps they were separated her body throbbed, aching to be rejoined, but she tried anyway to clear her mind enough to finally say what she needed to say, that she couldn't, she couldn't…. The words died a long death in her throat when his mouth found hers again and his fingers dug into her waist; her eyes closed and any desire to do anything else at all was vanquished.

Their hands found the clasps on each other's pants, pushing clothing aside in only the most urgent and necessary places, and then she was pulling and he was pushing, filling her, instantly striking her pulsating center. His hands wrapped around her thighs and lifted her, holding her off the ground, each thrust pounding her back into the cold stone wall behind her. She pressed her back up against it, allowing herself to be crushed in the attempt to reach the furthest depths in her that he could.

The storm of sensations reached its peak, again and again, raining shivers down her body. He covered her mouth with his own to stifle the cries leaving her throat, but soon was gasping his own, and arched finally up into her, bringing the full weight of her to rest completely on his hips.

Anders set her back down and resettled his clothes, then pushed her back against the wall for another kiss.

As he was pulling away Hawke took a few breaths, and tried to put all her thoughts back into order.

"This can't happen again," she breathed, chest still heaving.

Anders still said nothing, only flashed her a dark smile and a raised eyebrow as he retreated quietly back toward the street and disappeared around the corner.

Shit, she thought. Shit, shit, shit.


	11. Chapter 11

Hawke stepped out of the alley feeling like she had ice water running through her veins. With each step back to Hightown, she hated herself more, and with each step she desperately wanted to turn around and follow the familiar trail back to a certain clinic door.

Halfway home she just stopped walking, and looked up. The stars, the ever present, unflinching, breathtaking stars. Had there ever been anything that was more constant? They might rotate around a bit, but they always stayed exactly where they belonged. She kept her face turned to the heavens while she closed her eyes. She could go home. She could go to Anders. She could go to Fenris. She could say Fuck This Whole Fucking City and sneak out the underground exit Anders had shown her, strike out on her own and leave everyone behind. The world wasn't as small as it felt, she realized. It was only as small as she imagined.

She longed for rain. If the heavens opened up just then and drenched her to her bones, she would have taken that as a sign that the Maker was real, and that he cared about everyone the way the Chantry taught. She needed to be cleansed. She needed to have so many things wiped away.

"Hawke?"

There he was. Took him a while to emerge from his shadow, but he did. Whatever it was that beat in her chest, whatever ball of blood and flesh kept her standing upright and breathing, collapsed in on itself at the sound of his voice. It was all she could do not to let her knees buckle below her. But at least he couldn't have seen her and Anders in the alley. Not if he was there now.

He didn't say anything else, but she felt him get closer. She opened her eyes again to the stars. The pinpoints of light that flickered and hid, but never died, showing her how to stay steady.

What now?

He was close. She could see the white shine of his hair, the bottomless wells of his eyes. The tightly wound energy that he carried everywhere he went. Even without looking, even if she pressed her eyes closed until spots appeared, she could still see him.

She let her head fall forward, and she focused on the path before her, leading to her home.

One foot in front of the other. One breath in, one breath out. Step around obstacles in your path. The heart pumps, the blood flows. Walking through life was really pretty simple. How did she still manage to mess it up so badly?

His footsteps stopped when she reached her door but she didn't look behind her. The latch clicked open and she stepped inside. And there she was. Home.

And then there was a potion down her throat, a pillow under her head and a welcome blackness swallowing her up.

The potion didn't work for very long this time. Anders had been making them weaker on purpose. Weaning her off, preventing more marathon sleep sessions. She hadn't done that in weeks anyway, but she knew she couldn't stay on the potions forever, no matter how she was feeling.

It was dark, but the sun would begin its ascent soon and she was awake. Her body wouldn't let her sleep anymore. Her body only wanted more of what she had tasted in the alley. She thought of Fenris and her heart twinged, twisted and screamed, but the betrayal was already done, and she couldn't go to him now. Not with someone else's sweat still on her skin, and certainly not for the reason her body was demanding of her.

She didn't even bother with her leathers, just slipped on her boots and slung on her blades. And in her nightclothes she followed the shadows all the way back across town, the sky finally turning from black to deep blue by the time she reached his door. She picked the lock, and crept inside.

At the foot of his bed, she stripped everything off for a pile on the floor and lifted the covers, crawling up his legs to that warm, enticing center where his thighs met.

My turn, she thought as she took him in her mouth.

She heard him gasp and his hands found her hair, pulling so hard she thought he might rip it out, but she didn't stop. She didn't stop until she heard his anguished voice, until his whole body convulsed and his legs wrapped around her, squeezing and writing, and then going limp. And then she finished the journey up him, finding the nest within his arms, the crook in his neck, the pulse in his throat, the fire in his kiss.

But he wasn't done. He pushed her over to her back and directed her wrists up over her head, holding them tightly while he bound them in a smooth fabric, tethered to something unseen and unbending.

And she let go, and let him have her. Her only action in response was a simple request: "Harder."

She woke again to a gentle flickering of light and a feathery touch dancing down the vertebrae of her back, finding the dimples below her waist and the nerve center of her thighs. It had to have been day time, but without a window the little bedroom was completely closed off from the world, including any traces of the sun. Hawke rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and turned over to her back. Places within her were raw and tired, spent completely and aching with a deep satisfaction. She sighed, pushing away the rising wave of regret that was building and threatening to crest over her head, and looked over to the warm body beside her.

Anders was reclined with his back against the wall, and was arcing little tendrils of purplish white light from his fingertips to her skin. When she reached out to it he loosed a hair thin bolt that connected with her own fingers, traveling from one to the other and webbing up to her palm. She glanced up to his barely illuminated face and saw that while the deep pools of his eyes were serious, his lips curled into a quiet half smile.

He moved past her hand and sent the white spidery legs crawling slowly up her arm, and under the dim flickering light she watched the bumps rise as the skin around her hair follicles contracted and tightened, delivering tiny little zaps to the nerves beneath. It prickled pleasantly and she stretched her arm out to give him more space on which to play. Looking again to his face, she found herself searching for the similarities between his features and the glowing creature of her nightmares. But there were none at all in that moment. This was face entirely Anders; long slender nose, deep haunted eyes and delicate, kiss reddened lips, framed by that sensuous curtain of loosed hair. He was still thin, with his cheeks bowing inward gently and his brow standing sharp over the dark pools of his eyes, but he was stunning. Despite the fact that Hawke knew this face flickering before her so well, she still found herself unable to wrench her eyes away from it.

Hawke sighed. The decision she would inevitably have to make was a cruel one, and she wondered how long she could put it off.

His electrified hand found her shoulder and shivers traveled up her neck and over her scalp. She ran her own hand up his arm, feeling the curves of the muscle under his flesh and the soft curl of hairs fuzzing off his skin. His hand was square and soft, not overly large. Certainly the hands of a mage and not a laborer. But she also knew with a bone deep certainty that his hands were capable of a strength beyond even the strongest laborer. She had felt the forces that came from those hands. Without knowing what she was doing, she brought his palm up to rest on her neck, and closed her own hand over his, squeezing his fingers down. This collection of bones and flesh took her away from the world the first time. It was only a matter of time until Vengeance made another appearance somehow, and these hands would turn deadly again. If she survived Justice, Anders probably wouldn't.

The electricity died and the room fell black again.

"What are you doing?" he asked in a shaky whisper.

That was the question wasn't it? What in the blighted hell was she doing? Not just now, but with everything.

"I don't know," she answered, bringing his palm to her face to cup her cheek while she delivered soft kisses upon the tip of his thumb. "I have no idea at all."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

She was in her library trying to lose herself in a book when Isabela walked in.

"Thanks for ruining my fun last night," she said.

"Excuse me?" Hawke asked, shaking herself out of the sea of thoughts she'd been swimming in.

"I don't think anyone really had any fun last night."

"We could have," Isabela crooned, "if you'd stayed. Thankfully Anders came back, and in an even better mood for some reason," she continued as she flashed Hawke a suspicious look, "but, I was looking forward to spending some time with you."

"Were you. With me?"

"I was. I am trying to understand…" she said as she lowered herself down into the chair at the table, "how exactly it is that you have both those boys twisting in the wind."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Hawke said exasperatedly, thinking that this was not a conversation she really wanted to have.

"Liar," Isabela smirked, her tone playful, "I mean, you're pretty enough, skilled, made quite a name for yourself and all that… but you must have something awfully special hiding under all that armor."

"Not really."

"No?"

"Nope." Hawke answered, beginning to feel annoyed.

"Don't be daft, Hawke."

Hawke exhaled heavily and slammed her book closed. She had only been rereading the same line over and over anyway. She stood abruptly and walked the length of the room until she reached the end, and not seeing anything she wanted to stop for, turned and walked the length of it again.

"Fenris certainly isn't twisting in anything. He barely even looks at me lately," she offered.

"Wait, are you seriously disappointed because the moody little elf is acting like a moody little elf?" Isabela laughed warmly."Sweetie, that's what you get for going after that in the first place."

"Hypocrite," Hawke said.

"Ha! Any intentions I ever had with Fenris began and ended in between the sheets. I don't have the energy for that kind of project," Isabela said.

"And," she continued, "If it makes you feel any better he completely shut me down every time."

"Well. Actually that does make me feel a little better," Hawke said with a small smile. But also much, much worse, she thought.

Isabela returned her smile, her eyes twinkling a softness and warmth that seemed to be a quiet offering of friendship. Hawke felt herself soften in return, thinking how nice it might be to have someone to talk to about things.

"Anders, though, he is definitely twisting. What is going on there?"

Hawke collapsed into a chair and squeezed her brows with her fingers.

Isabela laughed. "Your life would be a lot easier if you'd just pick one and stop being so greedy with all the pretty men."

If only it were so easy, she thought.

"Who would you pick?" Hawke asked.

"Both, for a little while. And then neither."

"That doesn't help."

"Well, how about you just forget about both of them and come spend some time with me? There's still half that bottle left. Let me take your mind off those silly boys."

This made Hawke laugh."I'm not sleeping with you too if that's what you're getting at."

"Ooh, did I hear a 'too' in there? So you have had them both! You saucy minx!"

"Stop!" Hawke snorted, "this is not funny."

"Of course it is! Come. We're going back to the Hanged Man and you're not ditching me again. And if either of the boys show up then we'll just tell them to screw right back off."

Hawke laughed again, and it felt good.

"Actually, I know somewhere else we could go."

"Excellent," exclaimed Isabela, "I love surprises!"

The pool was much lower than it had been when she'd brought Fenris there, but it remained crystal clear and refreshingly cool. Hawke and Isabela floated lazily on the surface and Hawke let her eyes blur as they followed the full, white clouds drifting across the sky. The whiskey had made her pleasantly unfocused and loose, and she found herself very surprised to be enjoying Isabela's company so much.

"What you need to do is go to Fenris and say, 'When you're ready I'll be here. But until then, I'm having some fun," Isabela mused.

"I mean, who honestly says to someone, 'I don't want you, but you can't have anyone else either'? Bollocks to that."

"Well, he never actually said anything like that." Hawke said softly.

"So then what's the problem? Have your fun." Isabela said. "Though honestly, they both seem like a whole bunch of trouble. So much baggage. Who has the time for that?"

Hawke laughed, "have you never wanted more than just a fling with anyone?"

"Not in a very, very, very long time."

"And you've never been in love?"

"Love takes all sorts of shapes sweetheart. It doesn't have to be the 'til death do we part' business every time. And that doesn't make it any less real."

"Well, I wish could be as easy about it all as you are. If I could snap my fingers and make all these stupid feelings disappear completely, I think I would. Gladly. Get my mind back to more important matters."

"Well, good luck with that," said Isabela. "Okay, so let's say that tomorrow Fenris decided he was ready to be with you. That would decide it? It would be done?"

"Yes. I think."

"You think?"

"Yes…" Hawke started, "Yes. I think. I'm pretty sure. It's hard to even imagine that happening at this point."

"Well that's not helpful. Okay, new tactic," said Isabela, "close your eyes. Whose face do you see first?"

"Anders. But I think that might just be because…"she paused.

"Because?"

"Because I saw him most recently."

"How recently?"

"This morning."

"Ooooh, you are a saucy minx!"

Hawke sighed.

"Well, just do me a favor, Hawke. When the catfight ensues over who gets to claim the illustrious Champion's hand, make sure I get a ringside seat. If we're lucky they'll at least rip each other's clothes off before they kill each other."

Hawke laughed.

"Ooh, there you go! They can wrestle for it. Naked. Winner take all. I'd pay to see that."

"That would be a bloodbath," Hawke said, wincing at the idea.

"Perhaps. But it would be a sexy bloodbath."

Hawke laughed again.

"Or you can just join my crew and we can sail off into the sunset together. Lots of exciting adventures on the high seas, and never in one place long enough to get all tangled up in feelings…"

"Yes," Hawke sighed. "That sounds nice. Let's do that."

"Great. Next task: find a ship."

Hawke's thoughts went back and forth between the two men and she slowly found things getting a little bit clearer. Anders was giving her everything she ever hoped to someday get from Fenris, while Fenris seemed to be closing himself off to her more and more over time. But before this they'd connected so deeply, and she'd been infatuated with him for so long that he retained an inexorable pull on her. She didn't know what was driving the new distance since their talk in front of his house, but she'd decided that if he needed that space, she would give it to him. That is what you do for people you love, right? You let them have the things that they need, even if it hurts to do so. But if only she could have with Fenris what she had with Anders, then choice would be so easy. It wouldn't even be a choice really.

She also couldn't deny that Anders was capable of lighting a fire in her that made her forget about everything else. But that fire was often replaced by other things, especially whenever she remembered what happened in the cave. Her warning to Anders that she might kill him if Justice showed up again wasn't in jest. Sometimes she still woke in the night with that sickening vibration rattling her bones, and her ears full of of the unnatural roar, and her mind and body would go positively feral in response. She would jump from bed and stalk to her weapon room and begin to hit things until her fists bled, not feeling the pain of it until much later. He should be afraid of her. She didn't know what she would do the next time his spirit passenger took hold, but she knew it would probably be completely automatic, born of the primal instinct to preserve her own life. And she also knew a reemergence of Justice was an absolute certainty. He had told her before that he was losing chunks of time and losing control. What if Justice simply surprised her one day and she had a quick, mindless reaction? How could she love a man that she was afraid she might kill?

It had to be Fenris. Really, it had always been Fenris. Just a thought to the depth in his eyes and the curl of his lip, of the intense soul blending of the night they'd spent together, and there were no more questions. If Fenris hadn't been the one to push her away, those questions wouldn't have existed in the first place.

But that realization didn't satisfy her mind. She would choose him when it came to it, but he still hadn't even chosen her. Anders had though. Anders had chosen her long ago, and she would never have to wonder where his heart lay.

She and Isabela were stopped on the walk back out of the Wounded Coast by the sound of voices. Freezing in place, they both crept quietly into the protection of a nearby bush, and waited. But the voices were not coming from the path before them, they were echoing up the rocky slope to their rear. Climbing over to the edge of the overlook, they peered cautiously down toward the shore.

A ship and a very large one at that, was anchored out in the bay, and a smaller boat was being rowed toward a golden crescent beach.

"Ooh, who's a pretty girl then?" Isabela crooned as she admired the ship. She turned excitedly to Hawke, "let's take that one!"

Hawke gave a little laugh, but was too busy squinting at the bodies in the rowboat. She was sure she saw a very familiar symbol that struck a cold note of fear into her gut.

It took the little boat forever to reach the beach, and when Hawke finally got a better look at the figures that climbed out, her mind started to race.

The eye in front of the chantry star. Seekers.

"Why would Seekers be coming ashore here and not the docks?"

"Probably because they don't want to be seen," said Isabela.

"We need to go," she told Isabela as she eyed the path behind her, making sure it was empty.

"Why would the Seekers care about us?" asked Isabela.

"I don't know. They might not. Still, we need to leave." All Hawke could think of was talking to Anders. Whatever their purpose, Anders would need to be extra careful until they were gone.

Isabela let out a long wistful sigh as she cast a last glance at the ship, and they both crept back off the overlook so that they could stand up without being seen by the figures below.

As she stood and stretched, something hit Hawke hard, knocking her off balance. She stumbled a few steps and steadied herself, then stood back upright to look around.

"What was that?" she asked, turning to see Isabela's eyes looking back at her, wide with shock, her deeply tanned skin gone pale.

"What?" Hawke asked, and realized that she was feeling something warm and wet running down the bare skin of her legs. She looked down to see the front of an arrow protruding crudely from a place in her chest that it should not have been.

As black spots encroached upon her vision, reducing the world to a smaller and smaller circle before her eyes, she felt the ground come up to meet her. She didn't feel the impact, but she heard the ringing in her ears after her head bounced off the ground. The last thing she registered before the black spots ate up the rest of her was the glinting of the sun off Isabela's drawn daggers.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

A mumble turned into a growl and then got shrill, piercing through her ears and into the meat of her brain. It was like a bunch of tin cans being dragged down a road; sharp intonations clanging and echoing, rising and falling. There was a volume so loud she could feel the sound, vibrations rattling her teeth, and a blast. She could see red, a light through eyelids that she could not open, she tried to turn her head but it was too heavy to be moved. Everything was heavy. Just the work of breathing was exhausting, and she almost slipped away again, but she pulled herself, pushed herself toward the light, the red, loud light.

As she crawled her way through the fog, the clattering noise around her became voices. Her hand at her side ached and throbbed, and everything spun.

A hard push on her heavy head and she was able to move it.

And the sounds quieted.

She heard Fenris say her name, and then she was gone again.

The dreams seemed to last a lifetime, years and years worth of endless chases down hallways and caves and fields, bedrooms and wine cellars and alleys, all connected in a dizzying, inescapable labyrinth. There were faces and voices and rushes of feeling, filling her chest until it ached. She wanted to wake up, and she searched for the door out of the labyrinth, but every time she thought she was close, she instead faced a new unending hallway of faces and sounds.

Every once in a while voices broke through.

"Why must you be such a blighted fool?"

"I love you I love you I love you"

"I can't put something back in her that is gone. If you break your leg I can mend the bone, but if it gets cut off I can't make you grow a new one."

"You weren't there, you could never understand."

"Maybe if you weren't you."

When the words were followed by images, it was Fenris she saw. She saw the glean of silver hair, the blue serpentine lines, and shock of red ribbon. Squeezing her hand until it hurt. That must have been the aching, the throbbing. His voice growled, whispered, pleaded and softened. She felt him all around her, she smelled him. She felt hair tickle her cheek, warm drops of liquid falling on her neck. She moved toward it, letting it guide her out of her dreams, even if only to breach the surface for a moment before she fell back down.

It took three days before she really woke, jolted from her abyss by a deep concussive burst that brought her slowly into the light. Her head pounded and her ears rang with the remnants of the burst. When she opened her eyes the room was spinning and there was no one there above her. There was a dirty Darktown ceiling, there was the acrid smell of fresh smoke, and there was the piercing splintering and cracking of falling, breaking wood. She sat up on her pillow and Anders rushed to her, picking up her hand and kissing it, holding it against his face.

"Seekers," she croaked, her throat dry and thick. "Did Isabela tell you?" Anders nodded, and rushed to bring her a glass of cold water. She drank and drank, with him running back to refill it for her, again and again. His eyes were rimmed in purple and the stubble on his chin had grown dark and long. He looked small, like he had drawn into himself, becoming more compact and condensed. She blinked her eyes around the room and saw that everything that had been in it was destroyed. All the tables and separators that used to fill the clinic were replaced by piles of broken, charred wood. Anders rushed around her, quiet and frantic, taking her hand and kneading her fingers in agitation, readjusting his grip so many times that her fingers chafed together until she winced and had to pull away. She raised her sore hand to his face and lay it against his cheek and he moved into it, pressing against her palm. But his energy was too manic, thrumming at such a high frequency that it made her start to feel queasy. Was that his mana, she wondered? It seemed amplified to an extreme degree, yet mingled with a tiredness, and around him hung that sharp sulfurous smell that remained in the air after a big burst of magic had been unleashed. He must have fought, she realized hazily, and then taken some lyrium, to refill and artificially boost his mana. It was spilling out of him in waves that were making her feel like her skin was crawling. She had to pull away before she wretched.

"Anders," she whispered. "Go calm down." And then the room was upside down and she was gone again.

The next time the lights in her mind came on again, there was still no Fenris. The room was dim, and much of the refuse she vaguely recalled was now gone, cleared out, with the new emptiness revealing the scars and gashes of recent destruction. One new table was set up in the middle of the room, which was covered in vials and bowls. As she glanced around and took in all the changes, she registered something heavy and warm holding her arm down. Looking to her right she found Anders' head, resting like a boulder on her arm. She pulled on it, trying to extract her arm from under his weight, and when she finally had it back she had to pump her fingers open and closed, trying to get the blood moving through them again. Then she managed to stay awake for a while, quietly stroking his hair.

The next morning, at least she thought it was the next morning, Isabela was there, seated on a stool next to her bed. Hawke felt aches and pains all over, places where her bones had been laying against the mattress for so long they had started to wear on the insides of her muscles. She scooted herself upright and tried to sit forward, feeling the room spin, but not so much she couldn't handle it.

"How long has it been?" she asked

"Five days," Isabela answered, "Anders healed your arrow wound, but you lost a lot of blood. Most of it, probably."

"Who did it?" Hawke asked.

"I think they were slavers. I fought some of them off, but I couldn't get them all." Isabela said softly.

"Fenris?" Hawke asked, and Isabela broke eye contact and looked down, brows furrowed.

"I know he has been here. Is he here now?" Hawke asked, casting her eyes toward the back hallway and listening for voices indicating his presence.

"Fenris… is not here." Isabela said. "He knows about you and Anders. He knows everything."

Hawke felt her heart stop.

"How?"

"Anders… told him all of it." Isabela started.

"The cave?" Hawke asked and Isabela nodded.

"As well as…" Isabela paused, "the recent incidence."

There was a roar in her ears, coming in waves, with each rush louder than the last. Hawke cast her eyes again around the room, eyeing the scorch marks on the walls. Something big had happened here.

"They fought?" she asked weakly. Isabela nodded.

She barely heard herself ask, "Is he okay?"

"I don't know, Hawke. I can't find him. No one has seen him in two days."


	12. Chapter 12

"Where is Anders now?" Hawke asked.

"He had to run out to meet someone. He has been meeting with all sorts of people since I told him about the Seekers, but he won't say anything else about it," Isabela told her.

Hawke's dizziness increased, but she wasn't sure if it was from her blood loss, or from the swirling away of the world that happened every time she considered that it could the end of things for her and Fenris. Done. Finished. Not even the possibility of him someday being there for her anymore. Could it really be?

"Is there a bucket close?" she asked Isabela as her mouth filled with saliva and her stomach began to contract. Fenris needed to know about it all anyway. There was no way what happened between her and Anders, what was still happening, would remain hidden forecer. This was all inevitable, every last bit of it.

Isabela thrust a metal bucket into her hands just in time for her to empty the contents of her stomach. It wasn't much, mostly water and bile, but even once there was nothing left she kept heaving, painfully, eyes and nose watering with the force of it.

When she was done she lowered the bucket to the side of the bed, keeping it close in case she needed it again. .

"Tell me everything," she told Isabela. "Wait, no, you need to go back to the Wounded Coast. The slavers. That's probably where Fenris went,"

"We did that." Isabela said.

"Well you need to go again! Check every cave, every possible place that someone could hide. Walk the shore…" she was forced to stop as a sob bubbled up into her throat. She took a deep breath and swallowed it back down. Her mind was spinning, stomach store from the exertion of the heaving, and everything, body and soul, all if it just hurt.

"No, tell me the important bits of what happened first, quickly, and then go get Varric and Aveline and go back to the Wounded Coast. That's where he is, I know it."

"Okay," said Isabela. "Just the important bits." She took a deep breath and then began:

"Fenris was here for the first three days. He never left, not even for a moment. And being in the same room with Anders for three days, well, you know how they bicker already, even on the best of days. Like cats and dogs, those two. They kept arguing over stupid things until Fenris accused him of being in love with you. Anders admitted it, countered with how Fenris was, I don't know, keeping you on the back burner or something like that, and that he didn't deserve you. It escalated and Anders just came out with it. I don't think he meant to really, but they were both just completely enraged. Fenris questioned him more about it, got a lot of answers he didn't like… And then Fenris attacked. Maker's balls, they would have killed each other if Varric and I hadn't been here. And then Fenris stumbled off. He was hurt, but I don't think very badly. Burned a bit, singed some hairs. Probably needs to get himself a new set of armor. Anders got the worst of it, really, which is amazing considering Fenris didn't even have his sword. He tried his little glowy thing on him a few times, but Anders was expecting that so he was able to hold him off. Lots of fireballs. If we hadn't already been in a clinic full of potions I don't know if healing magic alone could have fixed Anders. Aaaaand two days later, here we are. So," she sighed, "that's the super short, condensed version."

Hawke leaned over and picked the bucket back up, her stomach convulsing again.

"Look, there's one thing that Anders did make clear. And that is that you love Fenris and that you told him that from the beginning and maintained it to the end. And I tried talking to Fenris too, about the stuff we discussed at the pool. So I don't know if that helps, but there it is."

Hawke coughed out the last of the liquid in her throat and sat back, trying to catch her breath.

"Why would Anders tell him that?"

"He felt bad? I don't know. Maybe he started thinking more about your happiness than his own for a minute? It has been impossible to get him to sit down and talk since then. He's been absolutely manic."

"Okay," said Hawke gulping at air, trying to calm her stomach before the heaving began again. "Okay, thank you. Now go. Go!"

Isabela swept worried eyes over Hawke, "I shouldn't leave you here alone. I'll never hear the the end of it from Anders."

"You'll never hear the end of it from me if you stay!" Hawke said angrily.

"Okay, okay, " Isabela said as she threw her hands up in resignation. "I'm going."

Hawke sank back in the bed as she watched Isabela retreat out the clinic door. Her heart was pounding in a way that let her know it was working extra hard, but as she looked around the room, she still felt the need to get up, to do something. How was she supposed to just lay in bed there and wait for news? Wait for things to happen?

But she had to talk to Anders. Which meant that she couldn't leave, not that she had the strength to walk anywhere.

She scooted up some more and swung her legs over the side of the bed.

Shakily, she slid herself over the side and took a tentative first step. Her muscles quaked with disuse and she felt the dizziness rearing up again.

She made it several steps over to a chair by the table and sat. She looked around the silent, empty room, her ears buzzing, the smell of burned wood still in the air.

And she cried, she cried so hard it echoed off the walls and she ended up with her head and arms sprawled over the table, knocking a empty bowl to the floor that landed with a hard clatter.

That's where she was when Anders found her. He gathered her up in his arms and sat down in the chair, cradling her. She rest her face in the crook of his neck and let him hold her, she felt comforted and safe, but she wished that it was Fenris there instead.

"Why are you alone?" he asked finally. "And why are you out of bed?"

"I made Isabela leave and go back to the Wounded Coast to look for Fenris."

"So she told you everything then."

"Yes."

Anders stood and walked her back to the bed, laying her down and seating himself beside her. He looked absolutely terrible. His eyes were still purple and gaped at her like open wounds, and his skin was as pale as death. He probably looked even worse than she did, she figured.

"I'm sorry," he whispered as he took her hand and held it to his lips.

Try as she might, she couldn't be mad at him.

"It was inevitable," she said, "as long as everything you said was the truth, what can I say?"

"You should have had a say about when and how it came out."

"Yes. I should have had that."

She raised her hand to his cheek and caressed it, feeling deep pangs of concern at how tired and defeated he looked.

Her eyes flew open, clearing away one nightmare and finding herself in a completely new dream. She blinked her eyes through the darkness of the clinic, not sure if what she was seeing was real, or if she was really still asleep. There he stood, in silver, black and red. He was just looking down on her.

"Fenris?" she croaked, and then she blinked and he was gone.

She pushed her legs over the side of the bed faster than her body liked, throwing the whole world for a spin, and then staggered across the room on wobbly knees. The front door was closed but not latched. Adrenaline burst through her at the realization, and she threw the door open, stumbling as quickly as she could out into the dark, dirty pathway. She thought she saw a shadow just before it disappeared behind a corner and she called out his name, but her voice cracked and didn't carry. He probably wouldn't have come even if he'd heard it.

She hobbled forward a few more steps and then felt her head start to swim again.

That had to be real, she thought. It had to.

She turned and made her way back into the clinic, latching the door and climbing back into bed.

At least he's okay, she thought. At least he's okay.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"We are going to walk you home today," Anders said. "I've got to leave for a few days and I don't want you in here alone that whole time. Besides I'm sure your mother would love to have you back so she doesn't have to keep making the trip here."

Hawke nodded. She woke that morning feeling much better, and had been able to get out of bed and walk around without as much dizziness.

"Where are you going?"

"I've got some business to attend to."

"Business?"

"That's right, just something I need to take care of."

"Since when do we keep business matters from each other, Anders?" she asked.

He sighed and dropped down before her. "I think I know why the Seekers are here," he said. "Those papers from the cave? They're in the Circle, and I think someone might have leaked information about them."

"Wait, what? The papers that I saw burn with my own eyes? Burned and frozen and then shattered into a bunch of pieces? Those papers?"

Anders nodded.

"It's a report from a Templar who witnessed part of a ritual. They were half eaten by the flames, and then the ice.. And well, you know. Anyway, I picked up the pieces and brought them back, but they didn't stand the trip well. Four days in my pack, wet, jostling around on the back of the horse… It only did more damage. They were unreadable, partially disintegrated and in so many pieces. I snuck them into the Circle and gave them to an Enchanter who thought she might be able to restore them, or at least make the pieces readable again. And I am pretty sure someone found out, and maybe told someone else…" he sighed heavily, "I don't know. But now there are Seekers in the Circle, conducting some sort of investigation. And Maker only knows what Knight Commander Meredith wants to do about it."

Hawke was speechless. She had barely given a thought to those documents since seeing them fall to the ground and break apart.

"So you're leaving… to go where?"

"Back into the Circle, to start."

"No, Anders, you couldn't possibly!"

"I have to."

"For what!? To get caught? Can't someone just get you a message about them or something? Why do you actually have to go in? And for a few days?… how are you going to hide in there that long?"

"It's too risky for information to pass through anyone else's hands. That is probably how this whole Seeker investigation came about to begin with. And I won't be there the whole time, I've got another contact that I am meeting afterward, a day's ride outside of the city."

"And what if you don't come back out of the Circle again?"

"Then I will go down fighting."

"Against Templars? Don't be foolish."

"I'll make them kill me. This might be it for me, I don't know. If it's not this it'll be something else. It doesn't matter, my life doesn't really matter. What matters is that things change for mages."

"Anders… let me come. I'm feeling better. I'll stay hidden. You'll need back up."

"And when Justice emerges and you turn on me too? You said yourself that's what would happen. How could I risk that?" he said, "and how could I risk you? I just had to pull you off the brink of death again. If I have to do that a third time… I don't think I'll be able to take it."

Hawke sighed.

"So there is no convincing you not to do it?"

"There was never even the slightest chance of convincing me not to do it," he answered.

"You had better come back! Because if you don't, you leave me no choice but to come in after you." Hawke told him.

"Don't! If I don't come back then just leave it be. Please."

"That's not going to happen and you know it."

"Maker's balls are you stubborn!" Anders yelled at her.

"Well so are you!"

Hawke stood and pulled him to her hard, wrapping her arms tight around his body, digging her face into his shoulder.

"I don't like this at all," she said.

His arms came around her too, and held on so tight she could barely breathe.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Her mother was glad for her to be home, and had tried with all her maternal influence to guilt Hawke into bed again. But Hawke had enough of lying in bed, had enough of being worried over and doted on. What she did want was a bath. And she wanted one even more when Bodahn mentioned that Fenris had come around two weeks earlier and had a bath himself one day while she was not home. She wondered where she was then, and what might be different now if she had had come back in time to see him. Probably nothing. Probably nothing at all. Maybe she should have tried to talk to him more, and not just shrugged it off when he started going quiet. Maybe if she had tried something, anything, she wouldn't have felt so disconnected from him, and would have been able to push Anders off her in the alley like she had meant to. And then of course, she never would have ended up in his bed in the early hours of that following morning.

She wrestled with the guilt. Fenris might not have told her not to be with anyone while she waited for him, but she still had the power to hurt him, and he still had the power to remove himself from the equation if she did. That wasn't a choice he was making for her, that was a choice he was making for himself. And then for it to be with Anders of all people, could only have made it worse.

It'd been three days now with no sign of Fenris, besides the late night ghost that she was no longer sure could have been real, and she felt the panic stuck in her throat, ready at the slightest urging to rise up and take her over. Isabela and the others had returned with no news, but did report a cave full of slaver corpses. She had no doubt Fenris was responsible, but Hawke had no clue where he might go next. And if it was really done, if things were really completely finished with Fenris, then what? Would it be too uncouth of her to just stay with Anders? She could be happy with Anders, she knew. But Anders would never be Fenris. No one else in the world would ever be Fenris. And what if Fenris came back? How terrible would that be for Anders to know that he was just a second choice.

She felt oddly comforted by the fact that the tub she was in had held Fenris just weeks before, and she closed her eyes and tried to imagine that it might somehow have retained a little bit of him. She took herself back to that day at the pool, when he had rest his head in her lap and let her caress his hair. They had been so safe and carefree with each other then, before she had done anything to lose him. Before he had come to her to tell her how he hadn't been able to stop thinking of her. She closed her eyes and sank down into the water, trying to pretend she was floating again, but the tub was too small and the water was too warm.

She sat up and inspected the new scar on her chest, right in the hollow between her shoulder and the top of her breast. You could always tell the difference between a an injury that healed regularly and one that healed as a result of magic. Like the one now adorning her chest, wounds healed by magic were smooth and shiny, with no knotted flesh or indentation. It was almost like someone painted a stroke of oil across the skin, oil that never dried but just continued to glisten. That would forever be the mark of her loss of Fenris. If he, it turned out, he really was lost.

Hawke got out of the tub and dressed, and then walked to Fenris's house, letting herself in. The fireplace was cold, and his book about Shartan was still open on the table, opened now to page 317. There were bottles of wine beside it, which she picked up and inspected one by one. She looked at the roundness of the lip, and the color and thickness of the glass. She searched for etchings and ran her hands along the bottom. One of the bottles was half full and she pulled the cork and took a deep drink.

She got lightheaded a lot more easily since the injury, and she had to be careful not to stand up too fast or she would see black spots in her eyes again. She wondered how long it would take her body to reproduce all the blood she had lost. She figured she should probably be careful with the wine too now, so she took two more deep swigs, then recorked the bottle and set it back down on the table.

Walking to the back of the room, she laid herself down in his bed, pressing her face into his pillow. It smelled just like him, and she clutched the pillow to her, breathing in his scent and feeling tears sting her eyes. Where could he be sleeping now? She knew that he was able to slip through the shadows undetected, as good as any rogue. Maybe he was coming home at night, and no one saw him. Maybe she would stay the night, in case he slipped in to sleep. Maybe I'll just stay right here forever, she thought.


	13. Chapter 13

For three days Anders would be gone, the first of those in the Circle and then on to meet yet another contact in his great web of mage rebels. If he didn't come back, she'd have to figure out where to begin to attempt to retrieve him by herself.

She tried to get him to tell her about the contact and his location and he refused. She tried to get him to give her a name of someone in the Circle she could speak to if he didn't come out and she had to sneak in, and he refused. She begged him to tell her who could show her the underground passageway into the Circle, just in case, and he refused. He refused to give her any options at all for helping him and it made her want to scream.

He was busy. Rushing around, consulting maps and having hushed conversations with fellow mages. The last few times she had seen the other mages he was consulting with, she made a point to memorize their faces and general appearance so she could find them again if she needed to. Petite, freckled redhead in a blue robe, big grey eyes and a bit of a snaggletooth smile. Average height brunette male, about 30, with a scar cutting through an eyebrow and a staff that had a jawbone on it. Tall, slender elf mage with black hair and a vallaslin that made her face look like it was locked in a cage. Easy.

The last hushed conversation she was witness to earlier that afternoon, she hid herself until they parted and she followed the mage to a door just outside the Elven alienage. If she had to, she would break that door down.

She paced the clinic in the hours leading up to his departure, which was to be right after nightfall. Her hands were shaking and stomach roiling.

"How many times have you done this?" she asked.

"More than I can say," he said.

"How deeply do you usually go in?"

"Depends."

"On what?"

He sighed, "Hawke I am not going to give you any more details to worry yourself over."

"And you think leaving me in the dark will make me worry less?"

"I don't like this any more than you do. If I find out who leaked… Maker help them."

"And what if that's not even why the Seekers are there?"

"Doesn't matter. I'd need to do this either way."

She continued to pace while he sat and drank a mug of tea.

"Come and sit, you're making me dizzy," he told her.

She dropped into the chair. She was so tired. So very, very tired. Tired of worrying, tired of crying, tired of waffling back and forth between Fenris and Anders. She dropped her head into her hands.

"You need to sleep," he told her.

"I slept for five days in a row."

"And barely at all since."

"How do you know?"she asked.

"I can tell."

"Great, another person who can see right through me."

"What?" he asked, confused.

"Nothing," she said, thinking back to Fenris and his uncanny ability to read her. Maker she missed him. She had missed him before he had even left. He had to be out there somewhere, and just didn't want to be found.

She hated the thought that he had gone back to the kind of life he had before they met; wandering from place to place like a ghost.

"And what will you do if Justice makes an appearance? You're going to be dodging Templars left and right, so chances are pretty good you're gonna get pissed off," she asked. "How are you going to keep Justice, or Vengeance, quiet?" she asked.

"Oh don't mind the rampaging blue monster man! Move along, nothing to see here!" she mocked.

Anders furrowed his brows in an expression of hurt."

She sighed. "I'm sorry. But seriously. How are you going prevent something like that from happening? If you lose control for even a minute that will be it," she said. He just sat there quietly looking down into his mug of tea.

"I just… I still don't like this Anders. Maker's breath, if I never see you again… I just can't. That can't happen. That can't be how this ends."

"How what ends?"

"Me and you."

And how would you like us to end?" he asked, looking deep into her.

"I don't know, but not like that. Not with you just disappearing too. Or dying. Even if we aren't… I still care about you. I care about you so much."

He stood to take care of his empty tea mug, and she followed him, wrapping her arms around him from behind and holding on. The clinic was dim and empty and the whole evening had the feeling of finality to it, even though Anders kept reassuring her that it would all be fine. But her heart was in her throat and she couldn't seem to get it to budge back out. Could it really be possible that she could lose both of them within weeks of each other like this?

She hadn't even come to terms with Fenris being gone, and now Anders was going to go sneak himself into a viper pit.

He turned and wrapped his arms around her in return, and she pressed her head to his chest and listened to his heart, and the slow breaths that filled his lungs. He stroked her hair and kissed her head, tilting her face toward him with a finger under her chin. He trailed gentle kisses over her eyelids, the tip of her nose, and her cheek.

She pulled away slightly before he got to her lips. She wanted to. She wanted to kiss him again so badly, but she knew that once his lips were on hers, that would be the end. Their clothes would be off, and so soon after losing Fenris she would be committing the same action that had blown her life apart and driven him away in the first place. But it was so difficult to hold back. Anders just did something to her that made it impossible for her to deny him. She didn't _want_ to deny him.

"We have a little bit of time left, before I have to go. But not much," he whispered, his lips still so close to hers it would only have taken the smallest advance and they would be touching. His pull on her was like being caught in a river current, and she was desperately trying to not to lose her footing and fall into him. But yet, she also wanted exactly that. He hovered there for several breaths, letting her be the one to choose the kiss. She felt impaired, intoxicated, completely unable to make a rational decision as long as he was hovering so close and pulling on all her senses.

Fenris was gone, and no one knew if he was coming back. But what if he did come back? What if he reappeared and decided to give Hawke another chance?

But another chance for what, she thought, to be strung along and pushed away?

And what if she never saw Anders again? What if he went inside that Circle and never came out again? What if these were their last moments together? What if this was the last time he could ever kiss her?

Her heart was completely split in two, and everything about the whole situation felt so impossible.

There were only two options available for both of them, either they return or they don't. What if both of them didn't?

She didn't like her odds.

She closed her eyes and took the kiss, letting him wash over her in a warm, dark wave. He kissed with his whole body, completely surrounding her and blocking out the rest of the world, enveloping her in a blanket of warmth and love. The magical caresses of his lips teased out little groans that surprised even her when they escaped her throat. Maker's breath, his kisses were like nothing else she had ever felt before.

Two men. Was she really, genuinely in love with two separate men at the same time? Every time she thought she was set on one of them, she would think a little too much about the other. She wanted Fenris. She wanted Fenris so bad it made her ill, and she would give anything to bring him back. But when Anders would stand before her, looking into her with those brown, soulful eyes, she wanted him too. He was actually there, and he was warm and kind and taking care of her. And unlike Fenris, he would give himself to her completely. And Maker, how could she possibly deny herself those kisses? Added to the fact that when her mind flashed back to that wicked little smile he had given her in the alley, she felt like her knees were going to buckle. Though the same thing happened when she flashed back to her night with Fenris. If Fenris was before her offering her the care and love that Anders did, the choice wouldn't be so hard. But it was.

Andraste's flaming arsehole, get a hold of yourself, woman! She told herself.

And there was the real possibility now that she could just end up alone. If neither of them came back, she would be absolutely devastated, she would be shattered. It was impossible to even think about. But what choice would she have other than to just go on the way she had gone on her whole life before them? She had never really considered herself the kind of girl who absolutely needed a man, even though everything she'd been through lately seemed to completely contradict that. She'd never been attached to anyone in her life in the same ways she was now, except for her family. She could be alone again, but she didn't want to be, not now that she knew how it felt to love and be loved.

It was all still the same conversation she'd been having with herself for days.

He pulled himself away, leaving her to feel like she was drowning, as he walked across the room. He peeked out a window to check if the sun was fully gone, stopping at a drawer on his way back. When he returned to her he slipped a vial of sleep potion in her hand. "Get some rest," he ordered. She tucked it into the pocket of her coat as he stood there appraising her with a grave expression. It was time for him to go.

"I love you," he said, "you don't have to say anything in return, but I just want you to know that." She rushed forward, wanting to hold him again for just a few more seconds, but he stepped back, away from her.

"I have to go. I'll see you in a few days."

They walked out together, and he held open the door to the little hidden passageway that was right outside the clinic, locking it behind her. The lock clicked loudly into place and she leaned up against the door and tried not to cry.

She went home to her own bed, downed the potion gratefully, and slept.

The next day she woke, and decided that the best way to get her mind off everything was was to finally get back to work. A good place to start, she figured, was cleaning up the nighttime streets. She decided she could no longer abide living in a place where she couldn't go for a walk at night without threat of violence, and she was sure there was someone who would pay her for the task. Most of the gangs had plenty of their own enemies, or just other people who would be glad to see them gone, so she enlisted Varric and Isabela and set a meeting time to begin a nighttime patrol in Lowtown.

"The leader of the Sharp's Highwaymen is rumored to be a man named Ignacio Strand. So hopefully if we can get rid of him, then that'll be one gang down," she told them as they sat around a table in the Hanged Man.

"Sure thing Hawke. Besides, if we kill them, then we can take their stuff." Isabela had said helpfully. "I like taking people's stuff."

"And it's been a while since I've taken Bianca out for a night on the town," added Varric. "She's been restless."

"Excellent," Hawke said as she chugged the rest of her ale, feeling confident and energized for the first time in weeks, "Let's get to work."

Silently they slid down the streets of Lowtown, coming upon pocket after pocket of loitering Highwaymen. The three of them naturally fell into a pattern where Hawke flanked the gang and then worked her way from the back of the pack forward, silently slicing through man after man. When she was eventually detected and the remainder of the group turned to face her, Isabela would emerge from ahead of them and put her daggers in their backs, while Varric stood at a distance and picked off the stragglers. With at least one collection of Highwaymen, she hadn't been detected at all, and had been able to kill her way through every one of them by herself. They made their way through Lowtown with a quickness, leaving pools of blood and piles of bodies behind them. Hawke lost herself completely in the hunt, quieting her mind and focusing only on moving through the dark streets as efficiently as possible. It was cruel, bloody work, but somebody had to do it. For every thug she took out, she was preventing the victimization of dozens of citizens. This would no longer be a town where people couldn't be safe outside their homes once the sun went down, she decided.

When they came upon a group of three Highwaymen who were moving quickly and with purpose, the three shadows followed, keeping a block's length behind. She knew that when the time came, she, Isabela and Varric could strike simultaneously, taking all three of them down before they had any clue what was happening, but first, she was hoping someone would lead them to the hideout and the leader. She wanted to put this gang down completely tonight, so that tomorrow they could focus on Hightown. And after that, the Docks. The Docks would be the hardest neighborhood, she figured, since it was the gateway to the city and the ships harbored there carried so many varied and unknown passengers. She would prefer to have Anders along on that patrol, in case they needed his healing abilities. Provided that he returned from his own mission without incident.

The three thugs stopped outside an unmarked door in the corner of a courtyard, and Varric, Isabela and Hawke watched as one of them entered, while the other two stayed outside talking quietly to each other. Varric aimed Bianca, and Isabela pulled small throwing dagger out of her belt. They lined up their shots and the two men went down within a second of each other.

They rushed the door and Hawke unlatched it without a sound, peering through the small slit and finding that the front room held only one man, who sat at a table with a flagon of ale. Hawke nodded to Varric and opened the door just enough to allow him to slide Bianca into place. He fired, and the man slumped forward.

They advanced quickly through the front room, stopping at the next doorway to listen to the cacophany of voices on the other side. It sounded like there were at least thirty men in the room beyond that door. Hawke considered her options. Three rogues in a room full of that many men was risky. With both her and Isabela sporting daggers, they had to make all their kills up close, one at a time, while Varric was not suited for close quarters combat at all. It would be far better for them to have a mage along, who could slow down the bulk of the group and cast wide nets of destruction so that Hawke and Isabela could concentrate on the killing blows.

This wasn't going to do, she realized. Out on the street the story was a bit different, as there were nooks and shadows, places to maneuver and hide, but a big, single room full of more enemies than they could handle at once was a recipe for disaster.

Hawke shook her head and nodded back toward the front door.

They quickly pulled the body away from the table and stuffed him into a closet, and retreated out of the house and to a nearby alley.

"We can either come back, ideally with Anders, or we can try another tactic."

"Lure them out and fight on the street?" suggested Isabela.

"Lure them how? What would do that that wouldn't just bring out everyone? That many men could still overpower us, even out here." Hawke answered.

Isabela shrugged.

"We can't do anything too risky," Hawke said and thought a moment, "Let's stake out here for a while and hope they stream out in smaller groups that we can take on as they come, and then we'll hide the bodies back in the alley. If we can't eliminate them completely tonight, we can at least put a dent in their numbers," said Hawke. "Yeah?"

Varric and Isabela nodded, both slipping away to find a spot on opposite sides of the courtyard.

She crouched in the darkness, keeping her ears tuned to every small sound around her. She heard the soft scurrying feet of rats and the tumble of garbage being swept down the street by the breeze. And for the first time since they had started out, did her mind turned back inward.

She needed to work more, that was clear. Here she was getting all distracted by a couple of men, getting herself strangled and shot through with an arrow within the space of five months. Nothing else like that had ever happened to her before in her four years of fighting her way up the Kirkwall ladder. But then she had to go and fall in love and she had faced her own death twice. It was pathetic, she thought. Those boys, as much as she wanted them, were just plain hazardous to her health. It was refreshing to finally feel like she might be gaining a little bit of perspective.

The doors opened, and six men exited, coming directly for the passageway that Hawke's little alley cut into. She registered the tiniest flick of a shadow from Isabela's position, indicating that she was on the move, flanking them.

The men didn't wear full armor, only a set of light leathers similar to Hawke's. Leathers kept her quick on her feet and repelled potions, projectiles and arrows, but they wouldn't stop a blade. The men were quiet and serious as they advanced through the courtyard, and Hawke focused on their expressions, waiting for the moment one of them sensed Isabela behind them. When there was a shuffling of the footsteps to their rear, and she saw the first curious crane of their necks, she leapt at them, taking advantage of the element of surprise. She sliced at the three men in the front with two sweeps of her arms, and two went down immediately while the third staggered back but stayed upright, eyes wild as he clutched a gaping wound at the base of his neck. Hawke heard the thwacks of Varric's arrows hitting other bodies as she advanced on the staggering man, kicking his feet out from under him and coming down on him with a blade to the chest.

Quickly, they pulled the six heavy men into the shadow of the alley, and then Varric and Isabela sprinted back to their stations.

With the action paused again for a minute, Hawke stretched her arms and neck while keeping her eyes on the door. She felt loose and purposeful for a change, not all confused and overwhelmed. She reaffirmed the need to focus on non-love related pursuits for a change, and then crouched in place again as she heard the door creak open. A smaller group emerged, and they didn't get far before they spotted the blood on the streets, but Isabela was on top of it, hitting them hard from behind before they had a chance to fully panic. Hawke joined her and the two of them brought the four down without the need for Varric's arrows.

They stayed out there for over an hour and the pile of bodies in the alley grew, exhausting them with the effort of dragging so many full grown men. She did a quick count and figured there was between 24 and 26. She was sure her estimate of 30 inside was off, but figured whatever was left had to have been much more manageable.

She let out a sharp staccato whistle, and found Varric and Isabela back at her side within moments.

"What do you think? Should we try to finish this?" Varric and Isabela looked at each other and nodded, and then they began creeping back toward the door.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hawke entered her mansion and immediately dropped her bloody leathers inside the door. She was bloodstained from her head to her toes, and was glad to stand in her tub and dump buckets of water over her bloodied skin.

She sank into her bed feeling exhausted, but despite the weariness of her body, sleep did not come. Fenris was out there somewhere, right now and she didn't know where, and Anders was off on a potentially life-threatening endeavor, and Hawke might not be able to help him. She wondered what they were both doing right then, what they were thinking. Would Anders be on his way to see his contact already, stopped to camp or stay at an inn somewhere? And Fenris… she didn't even know what to imagine for him. A cave, an inn, on the ground somewhere…? Was he on a ship, traveling to some new far off land? Or maybe he was close by, preparing his return. Once the thoughts had started coming, there seemed to be no end. After over an hour in bed had gotten her no closer to sleeping, she sat up. This would normally be the point where she would go for a walk, but her leathers were out of commission until they were cleaned and she had already just spent hours out on the streets. She should have gone to Fenris's house, she thought. Then at least she could lay in his bed and soak up his scent. She considered slipping over there in her night clothes, but pushed that idea away. She fell back into bed resignedly and laid there through the long hours until her brain finally quieted.

The next night was spent clearing out the Guardsmen Pretenders that hung around Hightown, and Hawke was relieved and excited at the prospect that her own neighborhood might be safe for a walk the next time she needed one. This time they brought along Aveline, who had already had her eye on the gang for a while. She knew precisely where the majority of the men could be found, and also recognized their leader, Captain Qerth. This night went much faster than the previous, as Aveline lead the charge directly to the gang. As soon as Qerth was sighted Aveline made a beeline for him and focused her considerable strength on bringing him down, while Varric, Isabela and Hawke surrounded the group and picked off the rest. It was a tedious battle, bloody and tiring, but when it was over and Hawke knew her neighborhood was now her own, and she felt almost joyful. After parting from the rest of the crew, she spent a good chunk of the night walking openly through the streets just because she could. And when finally her feet started feeling heavy, she walked not to her own home, but to Fenris's.

Or maybe she should start to consider it Fenris's old house, she thought. The sense of panic at his disappearance had worn itself down over the days into a heavy, cold resignation. Without any indication of where he'd go or what he would do, she felt powerless to search for him. She had heard nothing about any further slavers in the area that might draw his attentions, and he had left no sign of himself besides the bodies in caves on the Wounded Coast. There was nothing for her to do during the long anxious days, but wait. And hope. But one day in the future, she'd reach a point where she would stop doing those things too.

The scent in his pillow was already starting to fade, probably being replaced by her own, and she considered maybe just taking the pillow home with her the next morning. Perhaps that was sentimental of her, but she had to take what she could get at this point it seemed, especially if she never saw Fenris again.

She nestled herself down into his bed, wrapping around her the sheets that had once covered his body at night, and she wondered if she was just being a complete fool. Even if he hadn't left, he probably still wouldn't want her any more anyway.

This night sleep came easily, and she was immersed in dreams before her mind could run too far beyond her control.


	14. Chapter 14

Her eyes opened to Fenris's face. She blinked hard, again and again, making sure it wasn't an illusion, that she wasn't still stuck in some cruel dream. But he was there. He was really there, laying in bed beside her, peering at her from between dark, heavy lids.

She was instantly awake.

"Fenris? Is this real?" she asked, and it came out almost a squeak.

He grumbled an affirmation.

She sat bolt upright and looked down at him in shock. He was on his stomach with his face turned toward her, and he was dirty, covered in grime and dried blood. His shoulder pieces were curled and melted back, and his breastplate looked slightly warped, a result of the fireballs thrown by Anders she imagined. He had scrapes and bruises everywhere she could see, and a long gash down his exposed bicep that looked red and angry. She sat in shock for a several moments, and then began to feel overwhelmed with a million different thoughts and urges. She wanted to pull him into her arms and hold him, but she wasn't sure he would want that from her, and with all the broken skin on him it probably would only hurt. She wanted to fire off a bunch of questions. She wanted to yell at him for staying away so long. She was so relieved, but also saddened and nervous and afraid.

"You are in my bed," he grumbled into the mattress.

"I know. I'm sorry. I'll leave," she said as she continued to survey the destruction of his body, "but Fenris," she started, trying to prioritize her thoughts, "that wound needs to be cleaned. It looks infected."

He didn't respond.

"Can I clean it for you before I go?" she asked him, and he nodded.

She ran around the house searching the empty kitchen and washroom, and found nothing suitable for wound cleaning. Not knowing what other option she had, she slipped out the front door and sprinted to her own home, feeling such a jumble of emotions she wanted to simultaneously laugh and cry.

From her washroom she grabbed a bottle of alcohol and a healing potion, and then turned immediately to run back to Fenris, leaving Bodahn and her mother watching behind her in confusion.

Fenris hadn't moved a muscle. She grabbed a towel to hold below the gash on his arm, and poured the alcohol directly on it. He flinched when it made contact, and groaned quietly. She dabbed and swabbed at it, trying to rub away the grime as gently as possible while he stiffened and flinched with pain. The gash was deep, but the scab on it was very thick, and she figured it had to be at least several days old. But it radiated red into the flesh around it and looked swollen and tender. If only Anders were here, he could heal it no problem. If Fenris would let him. If Fenris could ever even be in the same room with Anders again. Which seemed unlikely.

But the potion should help, she remembered, and she pulled the small vial out of her pocket.

"Here, drink this," she said as she held it toward his hand. Slowly, tiredly, he lifted himself up into a seated position and Hawke was able to get a better look at him. His hair was matted and dingy, and there were numerous new dents in the remnants of his armor. It was clear he had been doing a lot of fighting.

He drank the contents with a sour face and then lifted his eyes to meet hers. She couldn't tell what he was thinking. As transparent as she might have been to him, during many moments he could be a complete mystery to her.

"Where have you been?" she asked.

"Hunting," he said quietly.

She wanted to say more, but didn't know where to begin. She didn't know if he even wanted her to say anything. It could very well be that he just wanted her to leave. He hadn't said so, but he must have been angry with her, he must have felt betrayed and lied to.

But he had been alone, completely on his own for almost two weeks now, at least that is what she figured, knowing how reluctant he normally was to accept help. Maybe he was ready to talk to somebody? But why would he talk to her?

She ended up just sitting there quietly, glad just to be looking into his face again. Even covered in dirt and blood, and looking as weary as she'd ever seen him, he was still as beautiful as she remembered.

He sighed, and looked for a moment like he might be about to say something. But nothing came, he only looked down at the floor and stared into space for a long time.

She stood to leave, figuring she would give him some time. Maybe he if wanted to talk to her, he would come her when he was ready.

Isabela had said Anders made it clear to Fenris that she loved him, and Isabela said something similar. Hopefully he believed that. Hopefully that was worth something to him.

She walked slowly across the room, keeping her ears alert for the possibility that he might call for her to come back. But he didn't, and with a heavy heart, she slipped out the door.

Anders might be home that night. She hoped that he would return without incident and she wouldn't have to go searching for a way to track him down. If he didn't she supposed she'd have to give him a little bit of a cushion before she started to panic. She'd just have to keep waiting, keep hoping. Seemed like that was all she was doing lately.

But at least Fenris had returned.

She made it halfway to her home when she stopped and turned around. The familiar ache in her chest seemed to increase with each step she took away from him, and she had the sharp realization that she had an opportunity to say something, and she should probably take it, especially if there was any possibility that he might disappear again.

She marched back through his foyer and into his room where he stood removing his armor. He stopped and turned to look at her. His reaction time to her was so slow she knew he had to be feeling a lot of pain.

"Obviously I know you know about me and Anders. I understand you probably hate me. But you and I weren't together," she said. Dang it, she thought, she probably should have planned out what to say first. Too late now.

"And I fucking love you and I have for a very long time and when I told you you didn't have to worry about Anders it's because at that time, you didn't. That was the truth."

She paused, "What happened later… I was not expecting to happen at all. But it did, and I'm sorry."

His expression softened a little, and he seemed to sink lower into himself.

"And I'm glad you're home. I'm so, _so_ glad you're home. And I hope you don't leave again." She took a deep shaky breath.

"So. That's all I have to say."

The words spilled out of her, and quick on their heels was a flood of emotion rising up and threatening to overtake her completely. Fenris gave no response beyond quietly looking back at her with tired, unreadable eyes.

She felt the tears welling up, knowing they would begin to fall any moment, so she turned on her heel and began the walk back out of the house. At least she had said her piece.

"Wait," he called this time. "You're here, you might as well stay a little bit longer."

She froze, surprised. Then exhaled and turned around again, nervously taking the steps that would carry her across the room toward him.

"Can you help me with this?" he asked and motioned to the armor on his wounded arm.

She closed the distance between them, and began fingering the warped shoulder piece. She finally located the buckle holding it on and gingerly undid the clasp. She pulled it loose and began to slide it off as gently as she could, trying not to pull too much on the skin around his wound. He still hissed with pain and she noticed that though the redness around the large gash seemed to have receded a little, it was not as much as she would have expected after taking a healing potion. She knew potions generally took longer to work on old, scabbed over wounds, and wondered if the slowness to work was indicative of the extent of his infection. That must have been why he finally came back, she figured. He wasn't feeling well, and was starting to weaken. That must also have been why he was letting her help him. She hoped he would at least start to feel some pain relief soon.

"I can fill the tub back home, if you'd like to come take a bath?" she offered softly.

He thought a moment and then nodded."Later," he said, "I want to just lay here for a little while."

"Fenris…" she began as she took a seat on his bed, "how angry are you with me?"

"Less than I was. But I don't think you really deserve my anger. You have every right to do what you want. You are not bound to me."

She exhaled, feeling a profound sense of relief, but also a deepening sadness. She had _wanted_ to be bound to him.

"But I do hate him."

She could say nothing to that.

"I'm just so glad you're back. I was so worried," she said, tears beginning to stream freely down her cheeks.

He continued to remove his armor until he noticed that she was sitting there silently crying. And then he came and sat beside her.

"What is this? You should be comforting me, not the other way around," he said and she laughed softly through her tears.

"But, I am covered in filth. Perhaps after I bathe, we can have a proper reunion."

She was stunned for a moment. Was he giving her.. Hope? It was enough to stop her tears for a moment, before bringing them forth even harder.

She watched his face as his tired eyes turned soft.

"Hawke," he whispered as he reached a hand out to cup her cheek, "sitting next to you those three days, wondering if you were doing to die, was one of the worst things that I could have possibly imagined."

"Why did you stay away so long?"

"I was angry. And afraid."

"Afraid of what?" she asked softly.

"Afraid that I had lost you. That you loved Anders. That you would die. That everything was all my fault."

"Fenris…" Hawke whispered, shocked. She reached up to his hand, threading her fingers through his. He gripped hers back tightly and looked at her with pained eyes.

"Have I?" he asked.

"What?"

"Have I lost you, Hawke?" Her mind sputtered as she struggled to answer. Almost, she thought. Maybe a part of me is lost. A part of me is with Anders now. But here was the true, original object of so much of her longing, finally back and sitting before her.

His grip on her hand tightened as he waited for her answer.

"Not completely," she answered.

It seemed to be more than he was expecting, and he nodded in acceptance.

"I… I need to rest," he said looking down at the bed. His pupils were wide and black and she began desperately hoping that it wasn't infection raging through his body that was slowing him down so much. How did he even make it home?

"Let's get the rest of this off you," she said, as she helped him remove his chestplate and belts. His lean body was covered in purple welts and cuts, but luckily nothing that looked as bad as his arm. When he was in only a loose pair of shorts, he slid under the covers of his bed.

"Stay," he whispered to her before he closed his eyes.

She lowered herself down beside him and slid her hand back into his, and watched his face as his brows unfurled and he slid into sleep.

Is this really happening? She asked herself in bewilderment.

Bodahn was happy to fill the tub with warm water, and after making Fenris take another healing potion, she led him to the tub and turned to leave.

"You don't have to go," he said and her stomach fluttered. How disorienting it was to go from him being so distant, to gone completely, to asking of her so many things she had always hoped he would. She listened with her back to him as he lowered himself down into the water, and then she turned around nervously and approached.

He groaned as he sank down, submerging himself up to the neck. She grabbed the bar of soap and a cloth and seated herself next to the tub.

He was quiet for a long time, and she was happy just to be close and let her eyes take him in again, still in deep disbelief. With each new invitation he extended her, she felt more and more like she was caught in a dream.

That was it then, she thought. If Fenris was finally coming back to her again, then she had to be done with Anders. Right? This is what she had wanted for so long, right? She had to be, even if that meant accepting that she would never again feel another of Anders' kisses. The thought sent pangs of desperation through her, but also made her grateful that she did let herself have the last kiss with him instead of holding back. It had to be their last if Fenris was really here. Fenris was the whole reason she had ever held back with Anders in the first place, and now that decision was being validated.

She hoped this was truly Fenris's return, and that he wouldn't change his mind when he was well again.

But her nerves fired up fiercely at the thought of Anders. If he didn't return that would be a problem of its own. And if he did, how could she stand to see him hurt? How much would it hurt her to have to resist him? They'd probably need to give each other a lot of time apart, she figured. Not that Fenris would abide them spending much time together anyway.

The whole situation was so fucked up, she thought, sighing heavily.

Fenris's hand breached the water and stretched over the lip of the tub to reach for hers. She happily took it, caressing over his warm slippery fingers..

"Sit up a little," she instructed him.

She moved behind him and soaped up his hair, and then ran the cloth over his shoulders, cleaning his cuts and inspecting old scars, the remnants of a long life with a cruel Master. He let out a soft groan and leaned his head back onto her shoulder as she ran her hands over the firm curves of his muscles. His soapy hair was drenching her clothes, but she didn't care. She closed her eyes and leaned her head up against his, savoring this next unexpected moment in the whole morning full of unexpected moments. It was like one of the many fantasies that she'd concocted while laying in bed at night, back before everything had gone to shit.

"Fenris," she whispered, "I'm so glad you're home."

"You keep saying that."

"Because it's so true." she felt the sobs rising in her throat again and swallowed heavily, trying to push them down, "I thought you were really gone for good." She dropped the cloth and wrapped her arms around him as much as she could over the lip of the tub, holding tightly to his chest and feeling a rush of emotion welling up and flooding her. He clutched back at her arms, and leaned into her neck. If this was a dream, she didn't want to wake up.

She could tell that he was still so tired. He needed more sleep. She wondered what all her had put his body through, out there on his own for two weeks. She would help him clean up and get well, and then they could figure out where to go from there.

She put a fresh towel within his reach and stood to prepare her bed for him. He was going to stay there as long as she could make him, hopefully until he was well again. She rushed into her bedroom and pulled down the covers. It was warm enough not to need a fire, but she fetched a glass of water to sit at the bedside table and figured he probably would also need food.

With the towel wrapped around his waist and his arm newly bandaged, she led him to her room.

"I have nothing clean for you to wear," she said as the realization hit her.

"I don't sleep in clothes," he answered. Fenris naked in her bed again… it sent a sharp thrill up her spine, and was enough to make her smile despite the heaviness that still wore on her mind. But rest was what he needed, not all the things that she was now thinking about.

She thrust two more potions into his hand, and he took them reluctantly. She hoped that would be enough to take care of the infection and get him on the way to being himself again. As much as she liked this soft, accepting Fenris, it also worried her. The empty vials clattered onto the bedside table as he climbed into the bed, sliding down in between the sheets. She couldn't help but eye the lean muscles and graceful markings of his body, but with how visibly sore and weary he was, combined with all the battle damage, and it was difficult to get much enjoyment out of the sight.

"Would you want to eat before you sleep some more? I can go see what we have in the kitchen?"

"Maybe later," he said softly as she slid down the bed and rest his damp head on her pillow, closing his eyes immediately.

She considered climbing into bed with him, even just to be near him for a little while longer, but her mind was racing, so instead she slipped quietly out of the room, leaving him to sleep undisturbed. He would need clothes, she realized, and the sheets of his own bed should probably get washed since he had had lain in them for a few hours while covered in dirt and old blood. She made a mental list of all the things that needed to be done, and set about, rushing over to his house to retrieve the sheets, and search for something for him to wear. He didn't keep much in the way of his own clothing and she had to search through several armoires in the mansion bedrooms before she came upon a men's robe and some plainclothes that might fit him. She also grabbed his armor and then sprinted back home, her arms full.

With Bodahn and her mother's help, she got all the sheets and clothes hand washed and then strung out in front of the front fireplace to dry, and then began assisting her mother with the preparation of some soup. Her mother watched her quietly as she chopped vegetables and stirred the broth, and gave her arm a concerned squeeze when Hawke left to go back upstairs to check on Fenris again.

It was now afternoon, several hours after he had gone to bed for the second time that day, and he was still sleeping so deeply he hadn't even changed positions. She crept quietly over to him, and laid her hand on his forehead. He wasn't feverish, and he was breathing deeply and evenly, face relaxed as his eyes danced around under his lids. The potions seemed to finally be working, or at least she hoped. She wondered where it was he had been sleeping the whole time he was gone. She wouldn't have been surprised if he was just sleeping on the ground.

She crawled onto the bed and settled herself on top of the covers beside him, gently resting her head against his back. She exhaled a deep, satisfied breath and tried to block out any thoughts about Anders. But she found that the effort was futile. She would need to somehow later that night if Anders had returned, which might mean a walk to the clinic. Would Fenris be angry at that? Would he expect her to stay away from Anders completely now? While she hoped that this meant the start of a new chapter for their relationship, she felt shaky and anxious at all the unknowns that still hung before her.

Her mind went again to the last kiss between her and Anders, where the world fell completely away and she felt warm and loved and completely swallowed up. He had run his warm hands over her face and through her hair, his touch both soothing and igniting her at the same time, and her heart quickened at the memory. But she knew that if she and Fenris were going to have a real chance, she would need to say goodbye to those moments. There could be no more of them, and to dwell on their memory would only make things harder.

Is that what she really wanted?

Despite the dreamlike wish that had been the whole day, she still felt disconnected from him somehow. She was genuinely grateful that he was home, that he was showing her such warmth and affection. But was she truly prepared to give up Anders?

She felt herself drifting down into sleep, and her last thoughts were how quickly everything in her life always seemed to change. Every time she thought she had gotten her footing, something new would come along to knock her back off balance. She was ready for some stability. She hoped that Anders would return and resume his normal clinic duties. That he would understand that she still loved Fenris, as she had been telling him from the beginning. And that she and Fenris could begin something steadier and less confusing, and that life could just be boring and happy for a while.


	15. Chapter 15

Anders wasn't back. The clinic had been empty, the few things that remained inside appearing completely untouched. She had grabbed a few more healing potions to have on hand for Fenris, and then stood in the middle of the cleared, battle-scarred room, trying to decide what to do next. Give him some time? Trips don't always go exactly on schedule. She ran through all the missions she had been on herself that had run later than she projected, yet were not the life ending disasters she was imagining for Anders. It worked to calm her, and besides, she thought, what could she really do in that very moment? What if he was just a few miles away, and would be arriving shortly? Hawke felt she had no choice but to go back home and give him one more day.

One more day. If he wasn't home the following evening, she would go to that door that the mage she had followed entered.

She crept back into her bedroom, assuming Fenris would still be asleep, but he was awake, sitting up in bed next to a newly lit candle. She rushed over to his side, but felt wary and cautious. She still expected that any moment he might revert back to distant, unsure Fenris.

He was staring into space and barely acknowledged her when she entered, but when she sat herself upon the bed, he reached for her hand. He had been holding it almost nonstop whenever he was awake and Hawke was relishing every second of it, but a subtle feeling of disconnection between the two of them persisted. The emotional divide created after spending so much time living in separate worlds didn't just up and fix itself so quickly. She still felt like he was so far away from her in so many ways.

"You're feeling better?" she asked.

"Better, yes."

She nodded, grateful. Finally, the potions had made progress. It had taken enough of them.

She caressed the fingers of his hand, staring down at the ungloved flesh and the lines of beautiful pale blue.

"One day a few months ago I was walking through Hightown and I thought I saw someone…" Fenris began, "a Tevinter magister and one of Danarius' friends. This man had a distinctive staff made of twisted grey wood that was crowned with crow feathers and a red jewel," he continued and Hawke settled herself on the bed to listen.

"I saw that very staff on a man standing at a market table, here in Kirkwall, and I froze. I almost put my sword into his back right there. And then he turned, and… it wasn't him. It was some other man, but he was definitely carrying a staff that I had seen a thousand times back in Tevinter. The sight of that thing, the memories it conjured, it triggered something," said Fenris. "I was so close to killing him, unprovoked and in a marketplace full of people, before even seeing his face. It was clear to me then, that somehow, even on the other side of Thedas, there are people around me who are, or who have been linked to Danarius," he said, and he looked down with pained eyes..

"I began to feel paranoid. I would walk through the city and feel the eyes on me everywhere I went. I cannot hide these markings and for any agent of Danarius there would be no question of my identity. These people could be anywhere, everywhere. I thought I felt them all around me. But I also began to wonder if it was all in my head. I realize now how tired I am of having Danarius hanging over me. If they are to come, I wish they would just do it. I will be grateful when I no longer have to wonder, and wait."

"And you didn't want to speak to me about this?"she asked,

"I did not, not until I was sure that I wasn't imagining things. But yet I couldn't stop thinking about it. You would have wanted to help, but I didn't want you chasing something that wasn't there."

"And now?"

"Now I know I was only being paranoid. I have spent the last two weeks hunting every slaver, every person in Kirkwall that I could find with ties to a Tevinter Magister, and I found nothing to indicate any other link to Danarius beyond that staff. I actually find myself… disappointed." He sighed, "So the waiting must continue."

"And that is why you were so quiet for so long, before? And why you returned?"

"I may have been quiet during that time, yes. My return is partly due to that," he said, and then his eyes flicked up to meet hers. "Also, you."

"I see," Hawke responded, and she brought his hand to her face and kissed it.

"I am sorry now that I didn't speak to you about it, about what I was going through," He said, then sighed and looked away, "It was during that time that I was so preoccupied that you and Anders…"

Hawke looked down at their hands, fingers intertwined and nodded sadly.

"It was my distance that drove you to him?" he asked.

"It was not your fault. There is no excuse," she said and then stopped. To tell him what happened would only make him hate Anders even more. And what could she say… Anders grabbed her in an alley and she couldn't say no? How could she present herself as trustworthy partner if she couldn't stay strong when she was tested? The memory of the encounter with Anders in the alley continued to set her blood on fire, but she absolutely could not let it happen again.

"It was a moment of weakness."

He broke his eyes away again and looked down, "I should tell you that I do already know the details."

"The details?"

"I had questions for Anders. He provided answers. He took the blame, but that did not make swallowing the news any easier."

"I cannot be absolved of responsibility,"Hawke said gravely.

"You were not bound to me, Hawke. I know that."

"But I wanted to be." she said.

"I know," he said."But you were not."

"Can you forgive me?"she asked, her heart fluttering, hope and relief coming in such intense waves that she felt tears behind her eyes again.

"If you can forgive me? I should have stayed with you that first night, Hawke. I should not have run, like such a coward. It will not happen again," he squeezed her hand tightly, anguish burning in his green eyes, "If there was anything I have learned from these past few weeks, it's that a life without you is unimaginable."

"Of course, Fenris," she answered, "I can barely imagine what you must have felt. I know you needed time, and I am sorry if I've pushed you," she said feeling the tears begin to fall freely now.

"I may have needed a push. But I miss you. Let us concentrate on the future now. Whatever it may hold, I shall remain by your side." Fenris said as he pulled her hand, bringing her closer to him. She couldn't help but smile at his words, at the soft, adoring look he was giving her.

Hawke immediately thought about what she might have to do if Anders did not return. Would he remain by her side for that?

But she would not panic until tomorrow evening. Anders could still return, and then there would be nothing to tell.

He pulled her in for a languorous and tender kiss.

His kisses were not Anders' kisses, but they were a beast of their own, his pillowy soft lips managing a forceful caress that Hawke obeyed, opening, welcoming him in. When his tongue entered her mouth, sweet tingles of arousal danced up her body. He might as well have been entering her everywhere.

But she had to dampen down the desire growing within her. Fenris encouraged nothing more beyond the meeting of their lips, and gave her an apologetic look that also showed a maelstrom of different emotions flickering and whirring inside the shadows of his eyes. She saw sadness and anger, pain and confusion, vulnerability and viciousness, but also a new openness. They rested against each other for a while, and with a weary sigh he eventually settled back down into the bed.

She kissed him on the temple and left him there, drifting groggily back into yet another stretch of sleep, and exited the house with a quickness to her step. She wanted only to walk, to see the stars, to breathe some cool night air, and think. She was grateful she did not have to fear being caught alone this time, as long as she stuck to High and Low towns.

A soft breeze brought the scent of the blooming flowers hanging from the surrounding balconies, and Hawke stopped to feel the cool air caress her face, feeling more confused than ever. If the Hawke from two months ago had a naked Fenris in her bed, sick or no, she would not be alone out on the street at that here she was, and she had even automatically began to walk to his house, her feet following the same path that they had so very many nights. But Hawke stopped herself, and instead turned again, toward parts of Hightown that she usually left unexplored.

Fenris was home, and not only that, he was spending the night in her bed. The thought made her smile, even though at the back of her mind hovered the source, the very embodiment of her torment: Anders. That picture of him remained in her mind, looking darkly out from under his long hair, holding in his bottomless brown eyes all the damage of his soul and the passion in his heart. It was that passion that he unleashed upon her in their private moments, and which had delivered the occasional welcome sting of pain, a pain she could barely acknowledge that she longed for. She recalled how their first night together in the tent they had kissed so hard and so long that it had made her lips bruise, and they smarted with pain the entire next day. On several occasions since then he had put his hands upon her with a great force that she found unexpectedly thrilling, and it was almost as if he knew she needed it. The pain, the strength she felt there, it jolted her out of her troubles and brought her vividly into the moment, planting her firmly in her body, unable to drift back away no matter what distractions called. He had said he understood the impulse, and indeed he seemed to know what she needed even when she had no idea how to ask for it. It was a talent of his that could only have been an ironic extension of his his healing ability.

She knew then that it wouldn't have been much longer before she would have given herself completely to him, and released Fenris to the struggles that kept him so far away. Probably even upon his return from where ever he had gone. She had just kept on resisting him, kept holding out for Fenris. But Anders had certainly carved out his own place in her heart. She had said she would wait for Fenris as long as she could, but Anders had brought that threshold right into view and even as she resisted him, somewhere deep inside she had begun to toe the line. Even Justice was less of a deterrent. The nightmares of that blue face still came to her from time to time, but recently, despite how Anders had insisted that he and Justice were one, she could only think of Justice as an entirely separate entity. He hadn't come out unbidden yet, that she had seen. It was inevitable, but it hadn't happened yet.

The chill she got when she considered what she might be facing in the coming days made her consider what she truly would do if she was faced with him again. An icy fear still crawled up her spine at the recollection of his presence, the roar, the energy that filled the air, the unearthly blue light that only seemed to illuminate further carnage. The Justice she had seen on other occasions, before that night in the cave, had never loomed so large; he had been merely a changing of voice, a blue flicker of the eyes, a spirit blade aimed only at Templars. Not a monstrous giant who killed indiscriminately. He was getting larger, more powerful. And though he seemed so separate from Anders, any strike against Justice would also have been a strike against Anders as well. The two seemed so separate, but they were not. Would she have risked her own life again, as well as his, and chosen to stay with Anders if Fenris had not returned?

She might have. Maybe she could have conjured up the strength — and overcome the primal drive for self-preservation — to find another way, a way to manage and elude his dark passenger for as long as the two of them could. To take whatever time they had together and make the most of it, the way she had chosen to on the eve before Justice strangled the life out of her.

Was she a fool for thinking Fenris would be better for her than Anders? Or the real question, she realized, was she a fool for thinking that she _deserved_ Fenris? She had lied to him, kept secrets, let her heart and mind wander. She was not bound to him, and he was offering forgiveness and a way forward, but that just made her feel like she deserved him even less. Could she behave herself, commit herself, and not royally screw everything up the way she already had, over and over again? Could she resist Anders the next time he was standing before her? More importantly, did she really want to?

There might not be another chance from Fenris if she screwed things up again. She had to be better, stronger, if she was going to deserve Fenris' love. Or she had to choose Anders and not look back. It was time to make the final choice, and then she needed to stick with it.

When Hawke entered the courtyard to return to her home, her mind was no clearer than it was when she left. Would that she could live in a world where she could have them both. For a moment she conjured up a fantastical scene of all three of them in bed together, writhing naked and ecstatic, hands and mouths everywhere. It was enough to make her almost groan, and she bit down on her lower lip as she pushed the vision out of her mind and reminded herself that Anders and Fenris had almost killed each other once already.

A shadow figure sat on the stoop of her door, and she froze in place when she saw it. It stood.

"It's just me, Hawke," said Fenris.

He walked toward her, stopping heartwrenchingly close.

"I think I am done sleeping for a while," he said softly. She still felt the pulsating between her legs from the fantasy she had entertained, and it wasn't helped by his close proximity, and his breath on her neck. He was wearing the robe she had brought him. It stretch down to his knees, but his legs below that were bare.

"Where do you go when you walk at night?" he asked.

"I rarely have a destination in mind. I walk just to walk."

"And what does this help you with?" he asked, pushing a strand of hair behind her ear. She couldn't help but wonder what else he had on under that robe, out here in the courtyard in front of her house. Her throat suddenly felt very dry. The moon glinted off the touseled white hair that fell down around the dark pools of his eyes, and she was able to make out the line of his markings on his long neck, pointing the way toward his lips.

"It helps me think. It helps me sleep. But mostly it gets me into trouble."

"It must be of great aid for you to risk that so often," he said.

"It's also probably just out of habit. What do you do when you can't sleep?"

"Believe it or not, I do the same thing. Only I seem to find considerably less trouble."

"Apparently I like trouble," she said. Trouble of every variety.

"That you do," he agreed, sounding amused..

Feeling bold, she took a step closer. He might have pulled away earlier as he had lain in bed, but as close as he stood now, the way he was looking at her, talking to her, she felt compelled toward him.

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall mention of a 'proper reunion,'" she said.

His lips slowly curled into a half smile and Hawke felt a thrill race through her. He watched her closely from under dark, hooded lids and she wondered what unrealized desires he might harbor deep in there. Despite the trauma of his past, he was still a man. He still had his own needs and fantasies. She hoped that she might come to know them first hand.

He picked up her hand and walked back into the house, leading her silently through the darkness back toward her bedroom. With each step into their inevitable future together, she found more of the clarity she had sought on her walk. This is what she had wanted for so long. The absence of this is what pained her enough to take her to Anders' door, that fateful night so many months ago. This is precisely what she had always hoped for.

Finally, her soul seemed to sigh.

Finally his lips were on hers again. Finally her hands were pulling his robe apart and pressing on his bare chest, running up his neck and tangling themselves in his hair. Finally he was pulling her against him as they settled themselves onto the bed, her hands pushing themselves under the robe to run along the soft curves of his torso. She rested them on the firm lines of his hips which responded to her touch with a gentle surge toward her.

"Are you well enough for this?" she asked him, seeing in her mind his slow, dragging movements of just a few hours prior, but his only answer was to lean in with open eyes fixed hard on her as he came in for another kiss. She was still fully clothed and the heat pooling between her legs was telling her in no uncertain terms that fact needed to be rectified, and quickly.

She tried to pull away again to pull her tunic over her head, but Fenris would not relinquish her, pulling her back in with a gentle bite to her lower lip. So she surrendered, falling back and letting his fingers do the work on her buttons while her own hands surveyed the landscape of flesh pressing itself against her. When her breeches were loosened, she kicked them down her legs and Fenris's hand found the urgent aching between her legs, his nimble fingers sliding gently into the slickness and pressing against the little bundle of nerves that was the center of all sensation. An involuntary groan left her throat, and he pulled away to rid himself of the robe completely, and she took the moment of separation to remove her top and the last scraps of clothing. Then his body was fast against her, keeping his hand between her legs, exploring, bringing a finger to slide all the way in and hold there for a moment, before resuming exploration.

She covered his hand with her own and began guiding him, showing his fingers where to press and what rhythm to keep, and immediately he was teasing a building pleasure from her that had her urging her hips closer and closer to him.

Then she moved to close around his solid length and she could practically feel him throbbing, the tip of him moistening her hand. She broke from his kiss to bring her hand up and lick the salty wetness off, holding it on her tongue, the very essence of the man she had spent so many nights longing for. At the realization of what she'd done, he growled and threw himself on top her, pressing his body against hers, grinding his hips against hers and and sending waves of an aching need reverberating through her. She wrapped around him and clutched his face to hers, kissing him with the desperation of months and months of suppressed desire. In that moment she felt everything else fall away, and there was only Fenris. There was no bed, no house, no city, no Anders. Just the man she had loved for so long, who was finally there with her, completely immersed in the moment. She fixated onto him completely as he slid himself inside her and began to grind his hips, plunging deeper and deeper toward her center. He pushed one of her legs up to her chest and found a new depth, burying himself to the hilt, and a low rumbling growl left his throat. The moonlight was shining into the room, outlining him in silver, providing a light just dim enough for her to see that his eyes were open. She clutched at him, filling her hands with whatever flesh was within reach, trying to stay tethered to him even as he was making her soar up into the heavens. The building sensations surged and heightened with each thrust, and an orgasm finally crashed against her, plastering her body to the bed and hitting her like a tornado, sucking and twisting, filling, spreading, expanding. She gasped each breath and clung to him tightly, trying to brace herself against the powerful shuddering that was threatening to rock her right out of her body.

After unmelting herself from the bed, with the remnants of the orgasm still spasming and sending bolts of sweetness into her, she opened her eyes to see Fenris still looking right back at her, watching her face with dark, intense eyes. She cupped his face, and looked deeply into him, connecting with him, bringing him into her so that any remaining distance from the past couple months was closed. The gaze only broke when she found herself pulled back to his mouth, needing to kiss him, needing to taste him again. She was riding up another building wave which finally, ecstatically crested at the same moment he arched into her, groaning into her mouth, exhaling deep, hot breaths through his nose.

After the slow descent, their bodies went still, but held tightly to each other, breathing almost in unison. Hawke dug her face into his neck and breathed him in, reveling in his specific Fenris scent the way she had imagined doing the last few nights she had clutched his pillow. She felt an immense swell of gratitude. Was this a gift from the Maker himself? Why should he smile down upon her now, after all the evils she had committed, both in thought and in deed? She had been so fixated on Fenris for so long that even when he himself told her that she was not bound to him, she couldn't believe it, couldn't believe that she might actually deserve anything close to forgiveness. Because that whole statement was just wrong. She was bound to him. She had bound herself to him long ago. That was the whole reason she felt such guilt at her feelings for Anders.

"Are you… okay?" she asked Fenris eventually, finding herself worried that he might be flooded with memories again.

"For just a second, there was something," he said, "but it is gone. As before."

Hawke's nerves fired up, feeling a shiver of fear. She nuzzled even deeper into his neck and kissed the dampened skin, squeezing her arms, her legs, trying to bring him closer.

"Was it as bad as last time?'

"It was… different," he said and his voice softened to a whisper, "Don't worry Hawke, I'm not going anywhere tonight."

He reached up to run his fingertips lightly down the back of her neck.

She let out a long breath and relaxed back into his embrace.

"Did it hurt?" she asked then, as she traced her finger gently outside the line of one of his markings.

"It didn't. It doesn't. It was perfect," he answered.

She smiled and took a deep breath of him, letting her smiling lips gently brush his skin.

He was still there when she woke, arms slung around her and breathing heavily in a deep slumber. She rolled over and pressed herself back against him, laying her face upon his bare skin again. This was worth it, she thought. Her smart, strong, damaged, sensitive elf man that her heart had been stricken by from the moment she saw him, was holding her in his sleep and staying the whole night.

She wished she could silence that resounding note of fear about Anders that was again ringing through the back of her mind. And about what Fenris would say or do if she had to insist on going after him. About what feelings might emerge once she was face to face with him again. It was there, persisting behind everything again. She could only try to ignore it, and focus on the man before her.

She ran her hands lightly up his bare back and at her caress he jumped awake, markings flaring briefly and lighting up the sheets.

"Fenris, it's me," she said quickly, bringing her hand up to his face. She heard him exhale and sink back down into the bed, the markings fading back into darkness.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I knew that, it was just automatic."

"Automatic?"

"I am no longer used to being touched while I sleep."

"Well you were touching me."

"Yes, and I still am," he said as he pulled her closer, until her body was flush with his. She luxuriated in the smoothness of his skin, sliding her legs up and down the sinewy length of his and scraping the bottoms of her feet up his calves.

"No longer? That implies you used to be used to it."

"I told you about... Danarius and how he…."

"You did," she interrupted, the memory of it jolting her. She reached up and ran her fingers lightly through his hair, tracing the lines of his face in the dark. She could feel that his brows were drawn, and she rubbed them lightly, trying massage the memories away.

"He enjoyed accosting me in my sleep. As did Hadriana. It has been a long time, but those memories remain."

"Of course they do. I'm so sorry," she said.

"It has been seven years now since my escape," he whispered."Seven years and three months to be exact, but there has been no one else with me at night in all that time. I am sure I will adjust eventually." He said as his arms repositioned around her back, clutching her tightly. She laid her head on his chest and lay a soft kiss on the fragrant center, right near his pounding heart.

"Would you rather be in your own bed?"she asked,

"I have no problems sleeping where I need to. Or want to. Though I must admit I have come to think of that mansion as home. More of a home than I can remember having before," he said, "Thanks largely to you."

"My home is your home too."

"It is. I am sorry for my reaction. I can't promise it won't happen again, but I hope you can bear with me."

"You truly plan on staying with me then Fenris?"

"I do, Hawke. I will try my best to be what you want me to be."

"I only want you to be yourself. And for you to let me love you."

"Hawke, if you truly want to be bound to me, then consider yourself _mine_," he said as he moved in for a kiss, "and I am yours."


	16. Chapter 16

"Tell me why," Fenris demanded angrily. "Anders is perfectly capable of taking care of himself."  
"If that were true, I wouldn't have been sent for," she responded. That morning Bodahn had heard a knock at the door, and found a note slipped underneath.  
Its message was cryptic, but could only have been concerning Anders.  
Please come as soon as you can, sewer entrance at northwest corner of the docks.  
"I'm sorry, but I have to go." Hawke said as she rushed around the house, filling her belt with potions, "I have to. I don't expect your help, but I hope you can try to understand."  
He stood in the middle of her bedroom, watching her whir around him, blinking confusedly after her. She came to a stop before him and pulled his arms around her, resting herself on his chest. He scowled but didn't resist, his hands falling into place at her waist and pressing her close. "Fenris, can you try to understand?" she asked as she nuzzled into his neck, kissing a trail up to his earlobe. "I just need to make sure he's not in trouble,"  
"So what if he's in trouble," Fenris growled, "let him rot."  
Hawke sighed.  
"Why does that abomination have such a hold on you? You cannot have us both. If you choose me, then you choose me," he insisted. His hands closed around her arms and he pushed her off him, bringing her face inches from his. "I am here, now and for as much of the future as you want. Why is that not enough? Why must you still chase him?" he paused, eyes going dark, "Was that night in the alley really so great? I can do that too you know," he said as she pushed her against the wall.  
He pressed his hips into hers and she felt him growing hard, sending thrilling ripples down her legs and up her spine. She took a deep breath and tried not to let herself get sucked under by the sensations surging through her body. With great effort she pushed him back.  
"Fenris," she gasped as she brought her hand up to his anguished face, "Please, yes, please do that again sometime," she panted but managed to pull herself together, trying to force the warm pooling arousal to drain back out of her. "But not right now. This is not about us, or me and him. There are bigger issues at stake here."  
"Bigger issues? You mean freedom for mages? You are a fool to fight on the side of magic!" he said, and then his eyes narrowed and turned suspicious. He pushed himself off the wall and stalked length of the room. "But I don't believe that is the only reason. And I don't think you do either."  
"It is true nonetheless," she answered. She was trying to believe it, trying really hard. "I would go after any friend who might need help. I'd do the same for you or Varric or Isabela or Aveline."  
"Fine, then I am coming with you."  
"Fenris you just tried to kill him! How can I believe that you won't just try again?"  
"I could ask you similar questions about what I should believe."  
Hawke couldn't deny that, and she felt awash with pangs of guilt. Guilt. She wouldn't feel that if she didn't think she was doing something wrong. No, she had made her choice and now it was time to be strong. She was determined not to let herself, and Fenris, down again.  
"Besides," he continued, "I am not coming along to help you save him. I am coming along to protect you and bring you home safely," he said decisively, "If you go, I go. You won't stop me."  
She sighed. She knew trying to stop Fenris was just as futile as Anders trying to stop her. Plus, Fenris was as good at stealth as she was and he was a powerful fighter. His help could be incredibly useful, as long as he could control himself once he and Anders were in the same room again.  
"Okay," she agreed, nodding. "Come along." She walked toward him and fell back into his arms, feeling him surround her again, his chin coming down to rest on her shoulder.  
"Okay," he agreed softly.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

They rushed through the city with the sun blazing down on them, weaving swiftly through crowds of people at the market, and headed down toward the glittering waters of the Docks. It took an hour from her house in Hightown to reach the grate and Hawke's heart pounded ominously in her ears the whole way. She had no idea what to expect, especially now that she was being accompanied by Fenris. At least the location she was given was close, and not a day's ride out of town. But what did that mean? Either he had already returned, or he had never left to meet his contact. But could that really mean he'd been hiding inside the Circle of Magi for four days?  
She dropped down into the dank sewers, cringing at the sour smell and the puddles of unthinkably foul liquids that she splashed into.  
"Ugh," she groaned. She glanced at Fenris to see him scowling too, picking his bare feet up and shaking them off before hopping over to a dry area.  
Cautiously, they made their way through the first corridor that led to a case of rickety wooden stairs stained black with grime. She heard low rumbling voices further within, the quiet whispering of the destitute refugees and hiding criminals that called this pungent dump their home. She and Fenris tried to keep their heads down and their profile low, but still felt as flagrantly out of place as anywhere she could possibly imagine.  
Whoever it was that they were to meet hadn't appeared, so they continued to press deeper into the sewers, sliding around dark corners and past the shadows who clustered together in the sewer nooks.  
When one of the shadows began approaching, Hawke froze, warily eying the body until he was only feet away. The figure pulled the hood of his cloak off his head, and she saw wide, fearful eyes of a young man.  
"Come!" he whispered urgently, and walked quickly ahead of her leading them through room after room and then stopping at the entrance to a dark, narrow tunnel that had been carved out of the wall.  
"Tell me what is going on" she pleaded when she reached him.  
"Anders only mentioned one person. A Hawke?" the man said.  
"I am Hawke. Don't worry about him," she nodded to Fenris.  
"Easy for you to say," he snorted.  
"Just tell me what is going on!" she growled. "Did he not make it out of the Circle?"  
"He didn't. Whatever it was he came for was no longer here. He… changed… in front of a room full of mages. Apparently he is possessed?" the man stopped looking at her with bewildered eyes, "Some mages fought him and wanted to kill him, or at the very least turn him in. Not everyone agreed with that, but they are holding him until someone makes a decision,"  
"By his fellow mages?"  
"Yes. We had no idea he was an abomination! He has done so much for us… he's led so many of us to freedom. We owe him so much. But… he is everything the Enchanters warn us against," he said and paused, swallowing heavily.  
"There is a war raging inside the Circle right now about what to do. But we won't be able to hide him much longer. The Templars have already noticed all the chatter, and have confined us to quarters and are taking mages in for questioning. We have to hurry," he said.  
Hawke felt her blood turn into ice water.  
"Hawke, you should consider leaving it be. Who better to handle Anders than his fellow mages?" Fenris said.  
"No!" exclaimed the mage, "the Templars will find him, and everyone who protected him will be punished as well! They are already jumping at any excuse to make us Tranquil! These are good people! We just didn't know. Not until he turned…"  
"Why did it take you so long to come find me?" Hawke asked angrily.  
"He wouldn't tell us who we could contact! Not until the Templars started their questioning. Their methods are…. cruel. It wasn't until the first mage was taken in that he asked for you."  
"Okay," she said, trying to steel herself for the ordeal ahead, "Take us in. Quickly!"

They crept down the pitch black corridor and one hour bled into the next, seeming to stretch for miles. It wound around corners, up hills and and over grates which sounded like they sat only feet above a rushing river.  
"If there is a way out of the Circle, why don't you all just leave?" asked Fenris eventually.  
"It is not as easy as that. To get to the exit you must go through the dungeons, and there are always Templars on guard there. Many mages have only made it that far, and were never seen or heard from again."  
"Well you got out, and now you're going back in. How bad could it really be?" responded Fenris.  
Hawke could tell he wanted to say more, but was biting his tongue.  
"The… the things Anders came for, they were not there?" asked Hawke.  
"No. The enchanter he gave them to was transferred to a different Circle the day before he arrived. No one knows why."  
"Have you seen the Seekers?"  
"Yes. There have been Seekers in the halls for weeks, but they disappeared along with the enchanter."  
Hawke sighed heavily. Anders was right. They must have gotten tipped off by one of the other mages.  
They moved diligently through the darkness for what felt like an eternity, and then Hawke ran into the back of the mage as he slowed to a creep.  
"We are close. We must be as quiet as possible."  
"You should let me through first," she told him. "Let me scout the dungeon before we all go through."  
"Uh, but you don't know where to go?"  
"I won't go far. Only as far as I have to," she told him.  
"Once we leave this door here, we need to go up several floors to the dungeons."  
"Go up to the dungeons?"  
"Yes, we are in the lowest pits of the caves beneath right now. Most Circles are built upon cave systems, for storage of volatile materials and arcane artifacts and such," he explained, "Some of the other Circle caves go much deeper than ours."  
She bumped into him a second time when he came to a complete stop right before an opening. The mage conjured up a small ball of light over his hand which lit the path before them, illuminating small chalk markings on the ground that the mage followed closely.  
They passed through even more rocky corridors and climbed up an uneven incline until they came upon an expansive room that smelled of dust, rancid oils and iron. The ball of light glinted off large statues and cases filled with dusty tools, and after some navigating around shelves and tables they came to the iron steps of a spiral staircase.  
Hawke's heart was pounding hard against her ribs. She had no idea what to expect or who she would encounter. Would Justice/Vengeance still be in control? Would the mages have any interest in anything she had to say? Would she have to fight the very people Anders tried so hard to help? Shivers traveled up her spine, and she realized that her hands were shaking. She shook the haunting image of the blue face out of her mind and took a deep breath.  
"Let me go. I will be back shortly," she said and without waiting for an answer she stepped silently around him. She heard him answer behind her after she was already well up the stairs.  
At the top of the stairs was a pale light, and she felt Fenris's hand rest itself upon her waist as she came to a stop. She jumped in surprise, having no idea that he was right behind her  
"I said I would go myself!" she hissed in a low whisper.  
"And I said I will go where you go!" he responded.  
She sighed and made her way up the last stretch of stairs.  
The light was coming from under a large, heavy door that didn't budge at the turning of the thick handle. She felt over the ancient metal panel below the latch, and felt a keyhole she could practically fit her finger through. Pulling out two of her biggest lock picks, she slid them into the keyhole and turned them around inside, keeping her ear close to listen for the telltale clicks that indicated when she was lining up the pins within.  
It took several minutes before she finally maneuvered the final pin, and despite all the finesse she put into sliding back the bolt, it let out a jarring thunk when finally it slid into place.  
She froze, wincing at the sound. It seemed to reverberate through the whole room.  
Sure enough, she heard footsteps on the other side, growing louder.  
Dropping to the floor, she pressed her face against the gritty ground and peered into the open slat under the door.  
One set of feet walked cautiously toward them, but she saw nothing else nearby.  
She was on her feet again just as the two shadows cut black gaps into the bar of light, and she swiftly opened the heavy door, pulling the Templar by his neck until he was fully through the doorway, and then twisted his head sharply until she heard the crack that made his body go limp.  
With Fenris' help, the body was lowered to the ground without making any further sound.  
Hawke peered out the open door toward the light source. Two Templars sat at a small table playing cards under a brightly burning lantern. Just feet away were the closest row of metal barred cells, stretching from the wall to the left across the full length of the room to just behind the backs of the men at the table. There was a second row of cells behind them, which stretched further than she could see into the darkness. Most of the cells appeared empty, though at least three seemed to house dirty figures who were crumpled up into the corners.  
She mapped out the shadows of the room, planning a route toward the two Templars, but the closest she would be able to get was still not close enough to strike with her daggers without emerging into the light.  
She figured she would have to use the sleep dust she had brought along and she began unlacing the small bag from the back of her belt.  
Fenris kept close on her heels and together they slid silently through the stretching boxes of blackness that lined the stone room. When finally she was perched at the edge of the closest shadow to the Templars, she blew a handful of the dust toward them. One of the men inhaled sharply as though about to sneeze, but then they both slumped quietly down in their chairs, faces scattering the cards around the table.  
She saw one crumpled figure in the cell sit up with notice as she moved fast to close the distance to the men. Fenris took one of the men and she the other, and they made quick work of pulling the two heavy bodies back into the blackness behind the heavy wooden door, dropping them in a pile beside the stairs. She located the small ring of keys that one of the Templars had linked to his belt, and then she let a low, sharp whistle down the stairs to call the mage.  
"What is your name?" she asked him when he finally reached the top.  
"Kellan," he answered and she urged him through the door. His eyes were wide with fear as he stepped into the light, but upon seeing it was cleared of Templars, he began sprinting purposefully toward an exit of the room.  
One skinny, bedraggled mage peered out from behind the bars of a cell and Hawke stopped to unlock her door. A second cell was occupied, though the poor soul within seemed to have recently expired. She wondered disgustedly if the Templars had even bothered to notice. The third occupied cell contained a sleeping man in tattered clothing who was snoring quietly, and she unlocked his cell though he hadn't stirred from his sleep.  
"Wake him, and then escape through that door. There are stairs and a long black hallway that will run for several miles. Be quiet and tell no one! Go!" she whispered to the skinny girl from the first cell and then sprinted away to catch up with Fenris, who had stopped to wait.  
"Great. More loose apostates," he groaned.  
"Shut up Fenris!" she snapped as they raced ahead to rejoin Kellan.

After what felt like years waiting and hiding in order to make safe passage between patrols of Templars, Kellan finally pointed them to a bookcase that was obscuring a hole in the wall. They all crept gingerly through, sliding down a long passageway between walls that was so narrow they had to traverse it sideways.  
Hawke's need to keep her senses sharp and fully alert, as well as the cold adrenaline that coursed through her, had been keeping her mind clear for much of their passage. But when Kellan pointed to another hole carved into the wall further ahead and said, "that's it," she felt her heart jump into her throat. She grabbed for Fenris' hand, trying to remind herself what she was there for. And that was not to rush to Anders and take him in her arms and cover his face with kisses. At least, provided he was even still there in the first place, she thought, and was still Anders and not something else. Fenris gripped her hand back tightly and she glanced back at him, taking in the beautiful lines of his face and his deep green eyes to try to steel herself against any errant impulses.  
The entrance was covered by a book case on the other side as well, and together the three of them pushed it forward until it they had a gap wide enough to fit through. They walked into a dark room, and when Kellan conjured up another ball of light, it revealed other dusty, overburdened bookcases that curved along a rounded wall. Hawke took a step forward and her foot kicked into something soft and heavy.  
"Can you make that any brighter?" she asked Kellan. His light flared larger, illuminating numerous robed bodies on the floor, that seemed to lay scattered outward from a central point. She bent down and inspected the two closest to her… and they were warm, and breathing.  
"Stunned, or asleep, or something…" she said. That at least was better than dead, she thought.  
She followed Kellan as he advanced further, and in the center of the room was a long haired body tied upright against a thick pillar of stone.  
"Anders!" she called as she rushed forward. He was unconscious, head listing forward and face completely obscured by his loosed hair. Dried blood trailed from his nose and down the front of his robe, and pooled on the floor at his feet.  
"Find a lantern!" she called to Fenris. She pulled a dagger and put it quickly to the rope that bound him, sawing it in multiple places until his whole body began to fall forward. She rushed back to position herself under him and caught his falling body, the full weight of him sprawling and cascading down over her.  
She lowered herself to the floor with Anders in her arms, his limbs completely limp and his flesh cold and clammy. She seated herself and cradled him in her arms. A brightness flared in the room as Kellan lit a lantern that Fenris held.  
He set it on the floor beside them, and then took several steps back.  
"Is he gone?" Fenris asked.  
"No, he is breathing," Hawke answered feeling a deep relief. She pushed back the tears that were threatening to come, not wanting to open the floodgates of emotion when there was still so much to do. She could feel Fenris' eyes on them, scrutinizing her closely.  
She lightly shook Anders and called his name, trying to wake him, but no matter what she did but he did not stir. Reaching back to the pack of potions she brought along, she pulled out a vial of healing elixir and pulled the stopper with her teeth. She tilted his head back and began pouring the contents into his mouth. She let it drip slowly, not wanting to choke him, and she felt his throat move with an involuntary swallow. When that vial was gone she did the same with a second one, hoping these would work faster than they had on Fenris. Anders' wounds should be relatively recent compared to Fenris's, since Anders had only been gone for four days, and hopefully had not been hanging on the pillar for the entirety of that time.  
The blood dried on his face didn't look that old… no this could only have been two days, maybe? She thought.  
She licked her palm and tried to rub some of it off his face, and then just held him for a minute, wanting so badly to put her mouth to his. Could her kiss pull him out of where ever he was?  
"Anders, please come back," she implored, trying to keep the desperation out of her voice. She wanted to pull him up and rest his head on her shoulder and hold him as close as she could. She wanted to cover his mouth and his face with her own and transfer all the love she could muster into him, to fill him with the breath of her life and hope that helped to return his own.  
She looked up at Fenris, who was watching her with dark, anguished eyes. She ached at the pain she saw looking back at her, at the worry and suspicion.  
And then she let her eyes fall back to Anders. He had a purplish bruise on his jaw and a split in his bottom lip.  
"What did you people do to him?" she asked Kellan. She tempered the wrath she felt rising by looking again at all the people scattered about the floor.  
"Is everyone else here alive?  
"They are… if this is a sleep spell, it's the best one I've ever seen," Kellan said shakily.  
Hawke removed a third vial of healing potion, and began pouring it into Anders' mouth.  
Suddenly his body lurched with a gag, and then he coughed, shaking and spasming with the effort. Hawke pulled the vial away, and her first thought was a thank you to the Maker. And then she tried to sit him up straighter, pushing him forward and patting his back as he gasped down the fluid in his throat. He took a few ragged breaths and then picked up his head to look around. When his eyes found her he seemed to break a little, and he fell forward to wrap his arms around her, pulling her in tightly as his breaths turned to hiccups and sobs.  
The world outside of the two of them slipped out of her mind as she let her arms close around him in return, pulling him tight to her and burying her face in his neck. The relief that flooded her was tinged with the bittersweet flavor of so many other emotions: despair, fear, hope. She clung to him and just sat there for a moment, breathing him in. His hair was stringy and dirty, smelling of smoke and oil, and the voice wracking his body with sobs sounded raspy and broken. She rubbed his back and closed her eyes, savoring the feeling of his beating heart and his rising lungs.

A loud bang jolted them out of their embrace, followed quickly by another, and then another.  
"Time to get going," Fenris warned sharply, and Hawke pulled herself away. She stood and then took Anders' hand to pull him up. He wobbled and swayed once he was upright, and then looked around at the room, seeming to be just as shocked at the littering of bodies as they had been.  
"Templars!" cried Kellan as he made his way in a panic back toward the bookshelf hiding their entrance.  
The rest of them had just turned to follow when a door that she hadn't noticed burst open violently, and several metal clad bodies streamed in with swords drawn.  
"No, no, no" she heard Anders cry, and then he turned to face the Templars as he pulled up great bursts of light from his hands and surrounded the four of them with a spherical barrier.  
"Anders, we have to go!" Hawke called, but she saw the blue light from his hands begin to spread, breaking through veins in his skin, brightening to a blinding intensity. With a quick blink his eyes were consumed by the burning blue and he lowered his body into a wide fighting stance.  
Her body was tingling with the need to run, but through the rising panic she noticed that she did not feel the humming vibration of the cave, and she could still recognize the features of Anders' face. This was not the Vengeance from the cave… not yet.  
"Anders! Control yourself!" she called and she stepped forward to lay her hand on his shoulder. "Your magic is useless against Templars!"  
"I am in control," he responded, his voice had lowered a couple octaves, but still holding on to Anders' cadence. "Just run!" he yelled at her.  
"I'm not leaving you here!" she told him..  
She felt hands close around her arms, and Fenris' voice snarled in her ear, "Yes, you are."  
"No, Fenris, I am not!" she insisted, but she felt her feet begin to slide across the ground. A surge of fury flooded through her, igniting and energizing her, and she yanked back with all her strength, breaking free of Fenris's grasp. She turned to face him and yelled angrily, "We came to get him out of here and that is what we are going to do!"  
Pulling her daggers, she advanced back to Anders' side and stood with him to face the Templars. Bouncing on her toes, she sprinted forward and darted into the shadows to their right, circling silently behind the clunky metal bodies to slice through the joints of the armor, her mind calculating all the little crevices where pieces of armor fit together but left small gaps to the soft flesh beneath.  
"Dammit Hawke!" Fenris called behind her, and then he was at her side, his markings flaring brightly as he reached into the chest of the Templar before him, causing the man to spasm before sliding to the ground. Ice balls crashed around them, but the Templars showed no reaction. She felt a sword make contact with her arm as one of the Templars let loose a powerful shock wave burst, and the room behind her went dim. The spell purge, which stripped the mages of their mana. Anders would truly be powerless now. There were six Templars, but they worked in a flurry of blood spatter and violence, and then she found herself standing at Fenris's side, glaring down at the pile of bloody metal. He looked over to her with a knowing expression.  
"You do love him," he said.  
"I also love you," she answered pointedly.  
Together they turned and walked back to Anders, who was no longer glowing, but was just standing and watching them with weary, purple lined eyes.  
"You have a nice holiday?" Anders said to Fenris. "Where were you off to? Go spend some time relaxing on a beach somewhere while Hawke was on her deathbed?"  
"Shut your mouth mage." Fenris snarled.  
"What? You can try to kill me in my own home and then abandon the woman you claim to love and no one is allowed to call you on it?"  
"Anders, this is NOT the time." Hawke warned.  
"Why are you even here? You probably figured this was the perfect opportunity to finally rip my heart out, am I right? Let the Templars strip me of my magic so you could get actually get close enough this time." Anders said, "Maker knows you weren't able to last time."  
Fenris's markings flared up brightly, his eyes going dark.  
"I am not here for you," he growled, "but if you keep pushing me, I will crush you."  
Hawke stepped between them,  
"Are you both fucking stupid!?" asked Hawke incredulously, "We need to leave, immediately, not stand here and fight like children!"  
As if on cue, the sounds of marching metal made itself known in the hallway beyond the door.  
Hawke pushed Anders forcefully toward the gap behind the bookcase, and then turned to grab Fenris' hand, yanking him along behind them.  
"Why did you bring him?" Anders asked.  
"Be thankful I did or we might not be walking out right now!" she hissed.  
The narrow passageway was empty. Kellan was long gone.  
"Anders you're going to have to lead us out of here. We passed through too many halls… I don't think I can do it myself."  
"I'm not sure I even know where we are exactly," he whispered worriedly.  
One by one they slid quickly down the narrow passage and out the hole in the opposite wall. As they emerged she heard the cries of the newly arrived Templars as they discovered the bodies of their comrades in the room behind them, and the three quickened their pace even more, racing as fast as they could manage through the series of connecting rooms that stretched beyond. Anders wobbled on his feet from time to time, needing to stop to catch his balance and Hawke stayed close, ready to offer a steadying touch.  
Digging back into her pouch, Hawke tossed him another vial of healing potion, and then one of lyrium.  
"Wait!" he called stepping in front of her to bring them to a stop. He tossed back the two vials and then picked up her hand.  
"You are hurt," he said as he appraised the gash in her arm from the Templar blade. She had barely felt it when it happened, and was too pumped full of adrenaline to even register the seriousness of it since. "You are leaving a trail of blood right to us," he said as he laid his hand over it. The gash got shallower, the flesh pulling together and narrowing to a smaller line, but then it stopped in its tracks.  
"…I can't. I don't think that lyrium was enough," he said, and she tossed him another vial.  
"No, this is fine… It's not bleeding anymore. Save your mana.." she ordered and then stepped around him to continue on, urging him to follow.  
They reached a room that Anders seemed to recognize and he came up to take the lead. They slipped quietly through hallways, and eventually descended a staircase that stretched for floor after floor.  
Hawke crept ahead to peek into the dungeon and saw that it was still empty. She waved the two of them in, and they quietly traversed through the long stone room. She almost ran into the back of Anders when he froze in place, as four Templars stepped through the doorway to the final staircase and stopped right before them, blocking their path.  
"Anders! There you are," said the Templar in the front casually as he removed his helmet. "Thank your fellow mages for us when you get the chance. It may have slipped my mind to do so during questioning."  
They all stopped and tried to catch their breath, panting heavily and still poised to run.  
"Thank them for what?" Anders asked.  
"For your capture of course. I had a good feeling about today. Something just told me that today would be a very special day," he grinned as he walked toward them, his eyes glinting cruelly. He was tall, towering right over all three of them, with close cut black hair and a hooked nose.  
"Then again, when you are Tranquil you might not have the presence of mind to thank anyone."  
"You will have to kill me first," Anders said, and Hawke readied herself to grab her blades. She remembered the shadows of the room, but they were currently stuck with a wall to one side, and the metal barred cells to the other side. There was nowhere that she could maneuver through in order to get behind them. Still, there were only four of the Templars, and she and Fenris had already dispatched six of them relatively easily.  
"Oh no. I wouldn't give you the pleasure," said the man as he continued his slow advance. The three to his rear drew their swords, and one let loose the shock wave that would drain Anders of whatever mana the lyrium potion had given him. Hawke felt the concussive wave pound through her chest as it flew past them and Anders sucked in a sharp breath in response.  
"Your friends here can rot in the dungeons. But look on the bright side, at least they'll have each other."  
Hawke felt the energy fill the room and didn't even need to turn to see what she knew was already happening. Vengeance.  
"Let us go," she warned the Templar. He only laughed.  
The hum grew until she felt her bones vibrate and teeth begin to chatter together, making her skin itch. Bile rose up in her throat, stinging the back of her tongue with its sour bite. Shakily she took steps backward, turning to see the glowing ghoul standing tall in the place that had once held Anders, and this time it really was the monster from her nightmares. The blue veined half-Anders of their last battle was nowhere to be seen.  
An icy dread crept up her spine, wrapping itself around her chest and making it feel like she wasn't getting any air. She glanced over to see Fenris to find him looking at her with wide eyes as she continued to attempt her retreat. But her feet fell clumsily along the ground and it took great effort not to double over with the waves of nausea.  
The room filled with the ear shattering roar, and she drew her blades as the Templars advanced toward Vengeance.  
And then Fenris was at her side, taking her arm and steadying her as they quietly crept away from the source of the deafening roar. He pushed her behind him, putting himself between her and the scene before them.  
The clanks and crashes of the combat only barely rose over the roar in her ears, and it faded away quick enough to make her wonder if there had been any real fighting at all. Only the buzzing caused by the eerie hum of energy remained. She peeked over Fenris' shoulder to see Vengeance looking down at the pile of broken Templars at his feet, limbs angling out in unnatural positions and dripping thick, viscous blood.  
Hawke gripped her blades tighter, repositioning them over and over in preparation for the moment he inevitably turned to them. He would, she knew. She watched him fearfully, taking one slow step back at a time.  
And then the moment came, and she had to fight the urge to close her eyes and block out the face that was moving closer and closer.  
Fenris flared his own shade of blue, and drew his sword.  
And they waited. With her heart thrumming against her ribs, and breathing so heavily she was getting dizzy, she watched his slow, unhurried stroll toward them.  
She tried to get a handle on her thoughts as the interminably long seconds crawled past. Could she break him out of it? Was there any hope at all of luring Anders back into control? She had to do something. They couldn't just continue to retreat, as going back further in the Circle only meant more Templars.  
She stepped out from behind Fenris with her throat closed and her ears ringing.  
"Anders!" she cried, but she barely even heard herself. Fenris tried to get between them again, but she stepped around him a second time and shook her head at him. Anders had to be in there somewhere, he had to be fighting to get free. He didn't want to hurt her. Trying again to call to him might be risky and foolish, but she had to try.  
She stood before the burning man, letting him have his slow approach even though it was taking all her strength not to crumple to the floor and put her hands over her ears. She thought she vaguely heard Fenris ask her what she was doing, but she held fast, planting her feet in front of the advancing beast that had haunted her dreams.  
And then he rushed forward, face twisted in an evil snarl. But she had her blades in her hand she met him with them, feeling the warmth spill out of him as they plunged into his belly. A second before that, Fenris' sword had sliced at the place his neck met his shoulder.  
Vengeance crashed forward, falling down on top of her and bringing her to the floor. The energetic hum was receding as the energy and life poured out of him and pooled on the floor around them. She squeezed her eyes closed until the sickening vibrations subsided completely, and then heard a familiar voice choking and coughing, dripping warm, coppery blood down upon her.  
She pushed him off and rolled over, feeling the panic surge anew as she registered the eviscerated body of Anders, which was spewing and spasming. But he wasn't gone yet… he was still coughing, still struggling.  
Hawke bolted upright, pulling her daggers from his belly and throwing Fenris' sword off the to the side. She grabbed the vials in her pack and scooted closer to him, picking up his head and lifting him up.  
She glanced over to Fenris who had also been knocked to the ground, and he was rolling over to a sitting position. He was okay.  
Again, she held the vials to Anders' lips and dripped the life-giving liquid in. She caressed his hair as she watched the color return to his cheeks, saw his eyes twitch under his lids.  
"Swallow, Anders." she whispered, feeling a lucid clarity of purpose. Anders was still here, which meant that full healing was possible no matter what injuries he might have endured. She emptied three vials of healing potion into his lips, the very last of those elixirs that she had, and then pulled out the lyrium. Anders' eyes opened and he blinked, his brown irises finding hers as the spasms stopped and his breathing steadied.  
"Now this one too," she said as she raised the lyrium to his mouth. She emptied her pack, feeding him every vial that she had left. Finally he sat up and began supporting his own weight, resting on one hand while he rubbed at the flesh around his brow with the others.  
"Can you heal the rest yourself?" she asked him, and he nodded weakly. His hand at his face found the spot on his belly where her daggers has struck, and Hawke felt an entirely different kind of energy radiate out of him, a soothing, calming sensation that warmed and invigorated. She was overcome with a fluid peace which enveloped both of them, ceasing the streaming of blood from his wounds and mending his skin before her eyes, leaving shiny scars in their place.  
Anders looked around, blinking through the fog that remained in his head. She left Anders' side to crawl over to Fenris, pulling him toward her so she could inspect his face and his body. He was completely unhurt. His armor was still warped from the fight with Anders weeks ago, but he was otherwise unscathed. She felt the last vestiges of fear drain out of her as she wrapped her arms around Fenris and held on tight. He clutched her back, scooting closer so that his legs enclosed her and she dug her face into the nook of his neck and just breathed. She let her body go limp, her weight resting completely against him. She was safe. She was completely, finally safe.  
She pulled herself up to kiss him, finding his lips with her own and savoring the taste of them. He tilted his head and opened for her, letting her in to the heat of his mouth. She felt his hand on her face, pulling her closer, caressing her, lacing through her hair.  
Anders gave a little cough and she slowed herself.  
She glanced over at Anders, who was looking down at his hands. Perhaps that kiss with Fenris had been cruel of her, she realized, but she felt like she had just been handed her life again. For the third time. She didn't have any more time left in her life to waste, she thought.  
She loved them both, but with whom did she had the greater future? The answer to that was clear.


	17. Chapter 17

EPILOGUE, NOT PROLOGUE

**************Six Months Later****************

The stream of sunlight pouring through the bedroom window warmed Hawke's face, and she sighed contentedly as she finished fully emerging from sleep. She rubbed her feet against the warm legs intertwined with hers, and savored the light, rhythmic breathing of the body beside her. She looked over to admire Fenris' face, so peaceful and soft with sleep, his black brows relaxed and smooth, eyelashes resting on the satiny skin of his cheek. When she reached a hand over to his chest, his lips flicked up in a little smile and he opened automatically, letting her slide into the little nook of his body. She still smiled at how he reacted to her in his sleep now, no longer jolting anxiously awake with the resounding of painful memories. They were busy making new memories together, memories filled with crystal clear pools, long late night conversations in bed and family dinners with her Mother, Bodahn and Sandal. Fenris was no longer holding anything back from her, letting her help him work through the pieces of memories that occasionally emerged, and talking freely about his hopes for their future together.  
She nuzzled her face into the hollow between his shoulder and his chest, and ran her fingers lightly along the markings on his neck, following the curving lines that she now knew as well as the back of her hand. He exhaled a breath that turned into a light giggle and then he gave a little shudder. "That tickles," he said, his voice still crackling with sleep. She slid her hand flat along his skin and ran it down his chest and then around to rest on his lean hips. He rolled toward her and his rosebud mouth found her lips, delivering a sleepy good morning kiss. She ran her fingers through his soft silver hair and felt a deep sense of peace.  
"What's on the agenda for today?" he asked as he nipped at her jaw, kissing lightly down her neck.  
"As much of this as possible," she sighed. "And then another meeting with the Arishok."  
"Mmm, yes, the demands of Qun…" he groaned.  
"But I don't want to think about that yet," she said, rolling on top him. "Not when there are more pressing matters at hand,"she said and she slid herself into place over his hips.  
He laid his back flat against the bed and bucked up toward her, his hands finding hers and lacing through her fingers. "Think about what again?" he asked wryly, his lips curling upward as he closed his eyes.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Some time after they returned from the Circle, Fenris and Hawke entered the Hanged Man, finding two stools together at the bar.  
"Shall I order you an ale?" Fenris asked, sliding his arm around her waist.  
"Nah, I've got my heart set on that other bottle of Finale tonight," she answered, leaning into him as his arm tightened. She saw Isabela giving her a smirk from the other side of the bar. She picked up her drink and began walking around the bar to where they sat.  
"Well don't you two look nice and cozy," she commented with a raised eyebrow.  
"That's right. What of it?" Fenris asked as he nibbled Hawke's ear.  
"Nothing! Just noticing. Congratulations and all that," Isabela said with a smile, raising her flagon to Hawke and then taking a deep gulp.  
"I'll be back as soon as I can," Hawke said to Fenris, giving him a lingering kiss.  
"Keep my seat warm?" she asked Isabela as she turned to walk back toward the door. Isabela slid into her seat and nudged Fenris affectionately in the ribs.  
Hawke closed the door of the Hanged Man behind her, and set out for Anders' clinic.

The lanterns in front of his open doors were lit to signify that the healer was in, and she saw Anders consulting with a patient on one of the new tables. He looked up and nodded to her as she entered, and she sat herself in the corner of the room while he finished up.

"Come have some tea," he beckoned, motioning her back toward his kitchen.  
"How are you?" she asked as she sat herself at his table. The shiny new scar across his neck peeked out from the collar of his coat, brushed by the tips of his blonde hair. He seemed to be letting it get longer than usual lately.  
"As good as can be expected I suppose," he said, sitting himself before her with two mugs of tea.  
She sighed, figuring she might as well come out with it.  
"I'm so sorry Anders," she said softly, reaching for his hand. "I can't even tell you how much I care about you. If things in our life had gone just a little bit differently…"  
"I know Hawke," he said sadly. He squeezed her hand and looked down into his steaming mug. "You've said from the beginning that you loved him."  
"I love you too, you know. I do," she said as she felt the tears threatening to emerge. "This is the hardest decision I have ever had to make in my life. But it is time for me to make one and stick with it," she continued. "It's not fair to either of you to keep dragging this out."  
"You're right. I am not arguing. I just hope that we can remain friends."  
"I hope so too."  
"Fenris isn't going to come after me if I talk to you?" he asked, looking up at her with his deep brown eyes.  
"No. We have an understanding."  
He nodded. "That's good. Maybe he's a little less beastly than I thought."  
Hawke laughed sadly, "He is not an unreasonable man. And for some reason, he is willing to trust me again. I can't screw that up this time."  
"Well that is a credit to him I suppose. He certainly has good taste in women."  
"Anders, you can't… try to seduce me any more,"she said, "No more professing your love and breaking out all the charm. It's not nice. And keep those damn lips to yourself please," she laughed.  
"Sweetheart, I can't help it if I'm charming and irresistible," he said with a gentle smirk.  
"Yes, well, please have mercy on me. I really need you to respect my decision. I'm going to do my best to do my part," she said, "If we are going to be friends, then let's be friends. That is just going to have to be enough."  
She took a sip of her tea and met his gaze over the lip of her cup.  
"I just want you to be happy," he said softly. "I mean that."  
"I want the same for you Anders," she responded as a tear dripped down her cheek.  
"Don't worry about me. I've made plenty of plans. I'm going to be staying very busy for the foreseeable future," he said and he wiped her tear away. "I won't have even a single free moment to think about you."  
"Plans, huh? What kind?"  
"Oh you know… _magey_ stuff."  
Hawke laughed softly. "Well if you need any help, you know where to find me."  
"I'm sure I will."  
Hawke stood and pulled him in for a final hug, squeezing him as tightly as she could, and then bid him goodbye to make her way back to the Hanged Man.


End file.
